Entertainment in Danger?

Grey

Looks like someone at Time Warner didn't get the memo that you're not supposed to bite the hand that feeds you. When we see populist tribes like EW making a clear nod at the Free Culture movement by picking the Grey Album as #1... that 2.3% year end gain may not look as bearable as it used to. First RIAA thought all was under control as the first quarter of '04 showed some 8% gain, the first real sign of life since their Napstercaust... ahhh, those lawsuits were working after all... and then it just slipped away.

We do have a few more tunes sold, some 120M, almost all iTunes, but no real rise here. The parents of all the labels saw their stocks go up a bit this year, but the whole market went up. The online stuff did not skim off traditional sales. I guess we still live in two fairly evenly divided worlds, the broadbanders and WhereWalmarters. It's broadband, not the free sites, that threaten CD sales and, I'm guessing there's a market of older people resistant to change and audiophiles that will prevent complete eradication of CD's for quite some time.

When will Napster be the musical Google? Will we ever get a musical Amazon? Once the legal nightmare ends you just know some Phoenix will arise.. who, where...WHEN? We still buy 5% of what Brits buy per capita, there is so much room for increased consumption, for all the players, until they sort out. The market is there, squelched only by endless, futile infighting. Who is going to get through to them that benevolence will be amply repaid if they poise themselves properly.

How many insults do these guys have to suffer before they change? DC and the courts will have to decide. There has to be an effort to simplify the law before individuals & small companies will venture into that morass. Public Domain - think about it... just a little one. I mean, really, to have to go back to the 40's for music to use? If not that, what is the solution? Shorten the term? Re-write it even more complexly? Require CC's to replace copyrights in some cases?

This is the year to mobilize. If things go the wrong way at the SC it will be a good opportunity for visibility and rallying not only the public but an increasing number of industries. Taking on the ISP's or telecom will up the ante. As for the public, it's crucial to get on point with a clear, positive & simple message that presents the upside in a compelling way. I think the concept of freeing some music for a public domain is fairly easy to get behind.

And, if things go the right way it will be a good opportunity to show DC which way the wind is blowing. Hopefully the Court would address not only the issue of responsiblity but public policy issues of balancing interests and economic stimulus. Overarching monopolistic protection dampens innovation, growth and free market competition.

BTW, the Grey Album's OK, mostly I like the simplicity of using only two albums, and the choice of the iconic White Album which was so much about revolution. Not only does it include the aforementioned song but the cover was white because the original cover photo of the Beatles naked was censored. I also love the merging of two very different sounds. It's a very visual way of conveying the mashup blend concept to the uninitiated, bringing publicity to this issue.

The idea that the album should be outlawed is outrageous if you listen to it... it's as fresh as it gets. It also gets across the concept that in this issue, it's all shades of grey. We all want that moral highground, aggressively so. But it's not black and white.

Slideways

Playing at the Aquarius, Sideways confused me at first, particularly the title, till I visualized it. I see the outgoing actor character pulling Paul Giamatti's dead weight character like a ball & chain, sideways, along the ground. The two childhood friends are travelling up the coast, through Los Olivas, which is a little wine region near Santa Barbara. Giamatti & the two women they meet are wine aficionados & from what I heard from a vintner at dinner last night, the dialouge was very authentic.

Anyway, the two guys approach life in opposite ways. One is a confident risk-taker who wants to have some big fun before his impending nuptials & the other is basically scared of his shadow, resistant to everything except his ex-wife, who's majorly moved on, until the end where he does finally open up a bit to a woman and shows some balls on a caper to help his buddy.

I do feel sorry for the flaccid folks of the universe. How do they stand such boring lives? What do they think at the end...wow I made a million meals and now I don't have to make any more... nice life, thanks god. I remember as a child asking my grandmother what was important to her and she actually did say food. Why do so few people really live their lives? I don't get it, I never will. I guess it's fear of risk. Some seem compelled in life to avoid pain & therefore risk. Others have more confidence in their ability to handle pain & adversity and put the need for security below the need for growth and excitement.

I'm sure heaven/nirvana will be very peaceful and happy, and many folks seek that peace on earth. That stuff is important to heal pain. I've cried tears here, many, they were salty and real. The material world is so changing and amazing, filled with imperfect and interesting people. I am exactly where I want to be, doing exactly what I want to do.

But I felt sorry for this little man. I hope the daring actor will have some positive effect on his life... it looked like it did, at least for a while. Do the boring ever get better on their own, or do they just latch on to a live one for their once-in-a-lifetime ride.. always being pulled sideways instead of unfolding in an upward or expansive ripple of risk? You can't sub out growth. No amount of money or fastening of oneself to another, or to a church or a social group, will give a person the understanding & connection they seek in life. It's a road we each have to travel alone.

This film is the subject of an upcoming discussion group at my church, where, I assume, the issue of various moralities will arise. The actor guy not only seeks to and does cheat on his wife-in-two-days-to-be, but he leads on and lies to one of the women he cheats with. I think most people would agree that's immoral & Giamatti doesn't really do anything overtly wrong except break and enter to retrieve his friends wallet containing the super-special wedding rings.

Jack is definitely about excitement & comes off as immoral, yet I sympathized and identified far more with him than the half-dead Miles. The lying crap, I hate. But, his overall attitude is far more appealing to me. I wonder if my church friends will see it the same way?

I wonder if they will notice the more subtle immoralities of the understated, underalive one. For example, he's the one who lets on that Jack is about to be married. Ooops... did that just slip out, did I just betray my friend? Was I trying to protect someone here, was I trying to be honest with this woman or was I jealous of my friend and secretly wanted to see him (literally) busted? Either way, the guy takes no responsibity, and even lies to Jack that he did not bust him. What about the immorality of not taking responsibility for yourself, hiding from your life, lying to your friend? I believe he also lies to the woman that he is a published author when he's not.

For me morality has to do with honesty, authenticity, taking responsibility for everything you can and dealing the best you can with the rest. People are sometimes so ashamed of honoring themselves or even just standing up and being themselves that they become some sad, buckled version of themselves. To me, that disrespects the unique person God created and is therefore immoral.

Parents do need to sublimate themselves to their children to an extent and sometimes people need to appropriately put their own individual needs below that of others in working or possibly even social situations, or in marriages. I'm not Ayn Rand here glorifying some self-absorbed lifestyle. I'm just saying that we need to accord our inner spirits the same respect and dignity we afford anyone else, and Miles' dishonesty, not only with others, but himself as well, makes his moral shortcomings more significant than Jack's in my opinion.

The Fan Plan

1/19/05 Update: Hatch, while removed as Chair of the Judiciary Committee is now chair of a subcommittee on Intellectual Property... do we have to offer this guy an indie label? Doesn't Michael Moore have a film he could score or something?


It occurs to me, particularly after the previous post and some conversations I've had lately that focused on the positive things copyright protection offers, that I need to do more here than complain. It's time to offer up some kind of direction, some kind of vision or plan. Basically, we need to have the top 2% of our music in the public domain and the rest subject to compulsory licensing for use over the internet in order to recoup music's previous prominence. But first we need to raise the profile of this issue to insure fairness.

I think all certified gold records should go into the public domain. In England, once you get to a certain level, you're taxed at 90%, so Elton & Paul don't end up owning the place. U2 outgrosses Ireland, they could run the place, instead they support it. The point is, it's not that unusual to take a steep increment at the far side of income.

Gold records got that way because the public loved the record, bought it, paid money, we have a stake. We made these hits into what they are today by listening, learning, singing and adopting them into our hearts. People who make gold records will still have a lot going for them, people will still want to make records great so they'll have a chance of going gold.

The original artist can still sell records, perform, whatever, it's just that now others can sample, mashup, add their own stuff to the original whole or bits, play it in bars, record their own versions which might be better or worse, go ahead and try... all for free, without having to ask anyone. Regular folks and aspiring artists of all levels can also burn their own playlists, or the original album playlists, and sell them on streetcorners, not just in NY. We can give a grace period of 5, 10, 15 years before they become public, or at least come under some type of Creative Commons license. Another possibility is to just take all songs written before 1960, or '65 or '70.

The point is to identify good quality songs, the ones that are really integral to our culture, that have already returned substantially to their creators, and free them up completely. It should be a badge of honor to be accepted into the public domain. Making it completely open is the key because of the tendency of those closest to ownership, and thus with the power, to complicate & exploit whatever restrictions are in place in order to skim off more profit. The superior knowledge always gets used against those trying to enter. In this case we are trying to free music up for the public, which has almost no knowledge of complex copyright law. Freeing the music (remember my slogan?... still need to make those T-shirts) would be a huge, exciting, newsworthy event that would invigorate the dying music fanbase.

Those with the master tape can still advertise that fact and charge a premium for it. Quality does degenerate with each copy, so the knockoffs never sound the same and for truly good music, people will pay a few bucks for fidelity. A few thousand of our most basic, classic popular riffs & songs would be like a treasure trove for all these burgeoning new tech savvy artists. You do a complete bye on royalties for the biggest cash infusions to the least productive, leechy aspects of the music business, decimating the most unsavory players, and still preserving rights for people writing songs and recording music.

Artists putting out good music will be unaffected unless they go gold (some 1% of the time), in which case, they can still make lots of money, possibly, if they were smart vis a vis their label. At least that issue will have to be addressed between bands and labels more directly. They still get visibility and leverage which they can use to establish themselves as a brand, an entity. They can parlay that status somehow, if they are smart. The oppotunities are certainly there. As long as they produce good work, they will continue to thrive. Isn't that how it usually goes... work, earn, build something.

Most gold records are by established artists who have absolutely no sympathy from me once their net worth goes into the millions. They have to cough up some of their lucre in taxes anyway, just make the take at the song level, where it can enhance our culture. Not only won't it inhibit them, it will encourage them to write new stuff instead of living endlessly off their first hit.

We live in a fast-paced society here, let's look to the future instead of petrifying the past. After 50 years of modern, post Les Paul music, there is not the base of fundamental riffs and melodies that was untapped in the 50's. We have to build from a much different clay pit here. We need to build up some of these basic tunes into more complex entities and that is exactly what is happening, illegally, with mashups. It should be legal, and encouraged.

Hillary Rosen makes the point that if people can pass property to their kids, why not copyrighted intellectual property? Land is very different from intellectual property. First of all it's much more finite and has intrinsic value. More importantly society does not have the same type of interest in freeing land for the public. While we do seek to preserve open space, at least in CA, land is not integral to our culture the way music is and it can not be dispersed productively into society, the way music can. Passing money from one generation to the next is also different. One is a fungible lingua franca, the other has unique value.

Moreover, cognizant of loopholes here, the law does in fact seek a huge chunk of property upon death through estate tax and what I am proposing here is very analogous to that. When we allow individuals too many rights, for too long, at the expense of the public, it needs to be addressed. And we know who the owners are here, we're not protecting these black artists in the 50's who contributed so much to our culture and got nothing in return.... we're protecting those who exploited them unconscionably.

Websites, TV shows, movies, mashups, podcasts,.. whatever it is you're making, the music can be much less of a headache. If freed up, these great songs will be everywhere and I guarantee you it will invigorate us like Napster did. People will sign on to new free music channels coming through cable, into their computers, start doing garage band, ringtones, karaoke, playlists, getting creative in small individual but consumeristic ways. While folks are getting the music they'll still be taking in ads, there is a huge economy there. If you don't believe me, ask Google.

Songs that haven't made it to gold status should make money selling CD's the old fashioned way to the fidelity oriented, or those without internet, still many folks. But we should have some sort of compulsory licensing system like the one I discussed in my EFF post (12/27/04) for those who can and want to download music from the internet. The thing is, compared to the limited public domain I describe, compulsory licensing can be a logistical nightmare. The music industry is already so bogged down by the complex system of ownership rights and payment modes that creativity is stifled.

Music is already free on TV & radio, but now it would be interactive and controllable, portable...much more fun. We already have the clip art type loops on Garage Band and others but this would increase the fun and creativity exponentially. The few thousand songs we're talking about here will soon become so overplayed it will make you long for muzak, making us hungrier than ever for fresh sounding artists, and new ways to combine the old standards. So, that's the big change I would propose for copyright law. The other changes are already occuring as the internet hooks us up musically.

The future is in sites like Soundclick, link above, which will get more geographically relevant and more a part of the fabric of people's lives. Artists should be able to upload original patchwork quilt music as easily as I'm now blogging, put it on a site where others can find it. On Flickr, where I keep my photos, someone, somewhere, liked my art and said so, right on the site. Well, in the future my local friends and far off strangers should be able to hear what I'm doing, comment, put up their own stuff, add to mine, email it, use it to audition for bands, get exposure & gigs for your band or video or recording projects... all online... where it can not only be heard and seen, but purchased or hired. Let's get the language of music out there on the internet and enjoy it.

Let's hope with bought off fucking Orrin Hatch out of his chair we can get some kind of rationality here. Yes, RIAA bought the senior Senator off by getting his music into the Oceans 12 movie. He turned his back on his "principles", which were apparently to become known as a songwriter instead of a fair and decent legislator. I've never seen such egregious governing and the fact that he could get away with something like that really says a lot about how far this issue is under the radar here. We need leadership and logic on this issue and this is what we've got... a righteous Mormon selling out our culture for his own personal gain and a bunch of paid lobbyists. It's outrageous.

The proponents are so busy in the courtrooms and backrooms, they barely bother to reach out to the public. We need an Abbie Hoffman, or some type of popularizer, for this movement. So far, Hank Barry is the closest we've seen. He sure tops sell-out Shawn, but Abbie was a committed revolutionary, and at that time we were talking about drafting kids, not rock & roll. All we have now is some businessmen, industries and politicians plus some movement in the universities and legal & political groups but we still need a unifier and publicizer. This could be a positive, creative revolution, a renaissance. We shouldn't lose this opportunity.

Lessig, Steele, Stoller, Pavlosky...all have done great things, making inroads on the campuses, courts & Congress. I hope one of them, or someone on the horizon, is media savvy and charismatic like Hoffman & Rubin were. Many of the artists. like Bowie, Don Henley, Sheryl Crow, Dave Matthews & David Byrne make statements but won't really assert to a full-on role. It's a huge role and sacrifice and a long fucking way to go, but think about how long the Vietnam War might have dragged on had middle-class Americans not had to watch American children beaten by cops and shot by Guardsmen on our streets. I'm not at all saying we need to go to those levels. I'm a pacifist.

But Abbie & Jerry knew exactly how to work the media & we need to get control of the message here. I'm a closet "pirate" no more, that's for sure. Was Robin Hood a thief? Yeah, a pretty sympathetic one. I've had people basically call me a thief to my face, in Silicon Valley no less, where we make the stuff that beats DRM. So, I think we need a little education here, people. Now, if folks seem misinformed, I direct them to Intervision.

Americans spend a huge amount of time consuming not only food and crap but tons of entertainment and news. Music competes with cable, software, video games, TV, film, magazines, books, sports, not to mention actual real life, if there still is such a thing. Those of us who are on this issue all love music, so let's unite and elevate here. Let's get people excited about music again. We will all benefit if this great unifier were to gain prominence.

Ripple

Ripple
Originally uploaded by Intervisions.

If my words did glow with the gold of sunshine
And my tunes were played on the harp unstrung,
Would you hear my voice come thru the music,
Would you hold it near as it were your own?

It�s a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken,
Perhaps they�re better left unsung.
I don�t know, don�t really care
Let there be songs to fill the air.

Ripple in still water,
When there is no pebble tossed,
Nor wind to blow.

Reach out your hand if your cup be empty,
If your cup is full may it be again,
Let it be known there is a fountain,
That was not made by the hands of men.

There is a road, no simple highway,
Between the dawn and the dark of night,
And if you go no one may follow,
That path is for your steps alone.

Ripple in still water,
When there is no pebble tossed,
Nor wind to blow.

But if you fall you fall alone,
If you should stand then who'�s to guide you?
If I knew the way I would take you home.

Robert Hunter

I wondered whether it would seem insensitive to print these lyrics after the Tsunami, but I think this beautiful, spiritual, calming Grateful Dead song is a fitting tribute to all those who lost their lives and loved ones. I started the large emanating heart of many colors, before the Tsunami, as part of the series of hearts and it was about the ever-expanding nature of out hearts and souls.

What we put out there into the world takes on a life of its own, blogging intensifies that effect significantly. At dinner tonight the conversation turned to possible repercussion. It's amazingly easy to publish yourself these days and begin that ripple. So, I will try to put loving, healing, inspiring stuff out there, in my blog, in my life... see where it leads. It all starts at the center.

The song is very Zen, with it's contradictory images and counterpoints. Most people know of Zen through its koans, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?", or "If a tree falls in the forest, does anyone hear?" The purpose of the koans is to snap people into consciousness by causing contradiction and confusion to their linear, logical minds. But, where Zen can be somewhat impersonal, Hunter's lyrics are warm and caring like Buddah. That was Jerry - don't look to me for answers, I can sing you a song and make you long for God, but you're gonna need to row there yourself.

Again, sort of a syncronicity with the previous post about the open water, sometimes the wave is gonna take you where it takes you... all you can do is float, maybe swim, try to grab onto something stable. And God may not always provide you with that tree to hang onto, but God will always provide you with the peace to face your fate, if you take the time to listen.

Alan Watts, the great translator of Eastern philosophy to the Western audience, used many water analogies, saying that each of our souls is like a drop of water to the sea. The droplet is separate, until it falls back into the ocean and then it is a droplet no more but part of the sea. He said, "As the ocean waves, the world peoples".

We are seeing disaster of Biblical proportion here. Think maybe someone/thing is trying to get our attention? If so, what is the message? Are we meddling with forces of nature? Have we strayed too far from God? Are we the infidels? Is it the exploitational Capitalists who rape the planet for profit, the rigid fundamentalists who kill in the name of God, the violence and greed within each of us... what? Give us a clue.

No matter the cause or possible meaning, the lesson to take is essentially a high-tech one. If sensors and proper warning systems had been in place probably most of those lives could have been saved.

Open the Void

I had a few contenders for this one: Touching the Open, Voiding the Water . This sounds really harsh, but, in light of the most recent and most horrific natural disaster, the Tsunami, there can't be much denying.... God does not care if you die, if your kids die, if you drown in the ocean, if you fall off a mountain...God does not care. YOU care. Those who love you here, care. Your ego, that knows the material world, cares. Your body cares about pain. God cares if you learn. God cares if you love. God cares far less about your physical life than your inner life. You are part of God, you came here to live and learn and be in a body so respect nature... it is not a fucking Disney ride. It is nature, it is God, it does not care, so take care of yourself.

Open Water is a great DVD, with lots of info about indie filmaking, and I'll also discuss Touching the Void, which I saw this summer. Open Water is made by a scuba diving/filmaking plus full-time job/young kid couple, who, god help them, deserve every success, about a young scuba-diving couple who get left behind a dive boat in, you guessed it...open water. It is based on an actual incident. Touching the Void was made about two men who ran into trouble decending a Chilean peak, and the DVD features their own interviews as well as re-enactments of their ordeal.

Both real incidents, but, no reality TV here, yet. All dialogue is scripted. Although some of the comments in Void were true, like "Simon, Simon...where are you??" In the all male Void, one guy literally cuts off the dangling "friend" to fall through a chasm in the mountain. They both somehow soldier on to survival, but the real world lambasts the cutter. Out in the Open we have the loving but late couple hanging out in the ocean doing, saying, thinking amazingly little except wonder where the sharks and boats are. Needless to say, the girl blames the guy, he gets munched by sharks and who knows if someone will come rescue her in time. Too many metaphors!

We often find ourselves stripped down to our essentials, facing nothing but fear, uncertainty, your god and yourself. I have definitely found this in nature, spending weeks at a time in very sparsely populated terrain, and I've gone days at a time seeing no people at all, just nature. It is a very risky thing to do and was particularly risky for me in a beat up old car, not even checking in with people, no cell phone or GPS in the 80's. And, unlike those in the movies, and most sane people, I often travelled alone. I felt God would take care of me, and, we were close. But I must have been extremely lucky, too.

But again, it's not just when you're voluntarily or involuntarily alone, or injured, or lost in nature (I've been both of those too, definitely not fun). I think people encounter the solitary nature of their strength & soul & connection to God in many ways throughout their lives... if they choose to do so and allow that in their lives. I think I prune down every seven years or so, go through a major life change, meaning, basically, I have lost people and pretty padding from my life, and that has promted much growth, and the addition of wonderful new people and lessons. But, pruning is cutting, it hurts.

I think the lesson we should take from these films, other than respect nature and connect yourself to God, is - how to choose our paths in life, make decisions that will lead to our true growth and happiness. The two films highlight two routes, based on differing circumstances relative to choice and control. On the mountain, the guys, if they just kept moving, could at least see which way was down. Direction was clear, the only issue was whether they could move through the pain. Real life rarely offers such clear direction.

In the open water, there really was nothing they could do. The only boats were very far and current was pulling them. Talk about afloat. They had each other, and their love., but no clear direction. In their case it was more about how to accept their fate than fight it, or strive toward it. It's like the cliche dorm poster (which I hope is in the public domain sinced I don't remember the author), but it's true;

God grant me the courage to change what I can,
The peace to accept what I cannot change,
And the wisdom to know the difference

I find it so sad to see people trying to change things they can't, like other people. Or, to see them accepting situations they could extricate themselves from.

Even the most seemingly powerful among us stand helpless to many things and even those that seem the weakest do have power in their lives if they choose to exercise it. We all answer to God. As Dylan said "You gotta serve somebody". The externals we see are meaningless compared to the inner workings of people, who face death and sadness and joy and love and confusion and choice with compassion or selfishness or awareness or obliviousness. That's what was on view for us in these films and we can see the same attitudes and choices in those around us, it's just a bit harder to make out without the starkness of life and death staring us in the face.

It's a big wide world out there, if the fishy sharks don't eat ya, the human ones will. Make peace with the fact that no matter what the life around you, it is filled with dangers, like all others, and it is up to you and you alone to make your life filled with learning and loving. Focus on the experience of your life, your real life, as you live it, and yet, vision the direction you want to go, when you can.

And, last lesson here, face your fears head on. Those cast adrift had to. You can probably ignore yours, most of us just avoid things that challenge or scare us. I guess everyone fears change to some degree. But, if you can't strip away the padding and face your fears, you're dodging your own life and power. You're on the run. You shouldn't need a catastrophe to address your own life, but, that is too frequently the case. It's often not till we face our own, or a loved ones, mortality that most of us test our mettle and learn those hard lessons, figure out what life is really about. By then it's often too late to make our lives what we would have wanted them to be. This is not a dress rehearsal. It is your life. Live it! While you can.

The Mindcontrolled Candidate

More Netflix synchronicity. The term is from Carl Jung, who wrote about collective unconscious. He was a student of Freud's who noticed classic archetypes and meaningful coincidences - synchronicity. This DVD came near the Bourne flick I just wrote about. Again, the Cold War, which was the setting of the book and 1962 film. Both feature men who can't remember. Seems there are a lot of male protagonists these days who are not in touch with deeper thoughts and feelings. Bourne, gets conked on the head, Carrey, in Eternal Sunshine goes in for voluntary mind deletion (see my 12/7/04 post) & the principals in Manchurian Candidate have had small but effective chips implanted in their heads. Well, you can't say men aren't creative in the ways they can figure out to numb their brains.

Like Bourne, this story is supposed to be current. This version features a monstrously mindcontrolling Meryl mom who's a successful politician in her own right (though she got her seat from her husband, not uncommon) and a venal Carlyle/Haliburtonesque Manchurian Global instead of Korea as the looming dark power. The great Demme tried to "stay in front of the news". Shooting started before Gulf Oil Play II started, but, the players are pretty obvious, especially when the film opens with a great Wyclef Jean version of Fortunate Son... we all know who that is. I just see Cheney & Rumsfeld's scared old Cold War visages on every twisted face on screen.

When I saw them literally screwing into their candidates brain I thought, you don't have to do all that, just pick someone who has already been cultivated, play to their ego, win their trust... isn't that exactly what we have? And, Jon even says the mom is the real villian, the real power. I do disagree though. Although the real imprint we get in life comes in childhood and mismanagement of that can really interfere in one's life, the kind of active, content oriented influence they talk about in the movie is very difficult in this day and age, unless you cut off media, and parents DO do that, even around here.

So, what's the big message? Our leaders are not in control - they are puppets of the military industrial complex Eisenhower warned of & Kennedy died of? Well, that's one of them, and the fact that we are all ever puppets of our parents until we find the chip and dislodge it is probably another. But, I see even deeper messages in this movie. It has to do with the reactions these men have to the lack of access to their thoughts and feelings. It has to do with the fact that there was some inner kernal each principal had, where they did remember and know truth.

Not just the principals in this movie but all these men with lost minds movies, and there have been many... these men are searching. Men are searching for truth. Careers are not panaceas, they don't address the inner needs. And if the men can't trust women, don't have women they can look to... it's tough... maybe as tough as it is for women to get male support in the workplace. Despite the current feel of these movies, or maybe because of it, men are not portrayed in the classic macho mode, they are portrayed as gentler but lost. They are trying harder, but the link between men and women is still fragile, we're still very far apart. It costs women careers and it costs men their wholeness. It costs our society to tip macho... wars start, people contract, socially and economically.... it's all connected.

When you talk about mind control you need to ask about free will. Can someone's mind be controlled by others? Absolutely. We've all heard about the cults, several of whom have committed mass suicide & heard war stories. Demme said something very interesting in the commentary track. He said that what he learned about mind control in making this film is that you don't need torture to control someone. The key is sleep deprivation and making them uncomfortable and disoriented. Another classic mode used by the Moonies, and other cults, is to deny privacy. Without any access to their inner guides, people lose their center and look to those around them to tell them what to do... and then... they often do it. We can clearly see the danger when it comes to cults, but that doesn't happen to us, right? As I said in the reality posts (12/31/04 & 11/26/04), we often can't see things when they are too close.

I don't know anyone who has focused more on keeping in touch with intuition and center than myself, BUT, when I heard Demme say that all you really need is lack of sleep.... so much came clear. When my kids were young, the combination of pregnancy and childcare, and my marital situation, left me extremely sleep deprived for many years. Although I'm usually very protective of my alone time, that's just impossible as a diligent young mom...so, no privacy either. For many years, I was a good mom, but I was not really myself.

In a way, it absolutely is brainwashing. It has all the attributes, and the fact that it may have been a good and right and extrememly common choice does not change that fact. However, as the film so wonderfully highlighted, there is always a kernal of truth that survives. Our core never leaves us. It can feel like a recurrent dream, as in the film, or an unidentified longing or incompleteness. Sometimes we barely see, hear, feel it, BUT, it never leaves us completely. God never leaves us completely, we just stop listening sometimes. I was very lucky. I walked into a band room one night, and the music & other things brought me back. It would have happened anyway, though maybe not so Tsunami-like.

It's not just the men that are lost, it's all of us. The constant backgound soundtrack of our lives fills us with so much noise and so little silence. How many of us understand the value of spending time to just connect with our inner voices, thinking about who and where and what we are? Most don't dare do that, because it will cause them confusion, or, they might have to make changes, and people fear change. I did. We focus on this exciting and demanding world of coworkers and family members, who all want something from us, and media constantly coming at us.

I was found, and then I lost it for a while when I focused on my career and law school and a fabulous love affair and then my kids. It was worth it, so they will have a chance at inner peace for their own lives, so I could experience putting others truly before myself, so I could be in full relationship to someone else, so I could learn and earn. Fortunately for me, I had built something very solid and real that I was able to call upon to find myself again. I had spent many years in my youth questing for peace, learning about psychology and spirituality, meditating, focusing on awareness etc. partially because my parenting had been so harsh. For some, all that's been built has been a career or some type of external structure and, for all the external benefit that affords, it means very little in the end compared to the inner structure of peace, love and understanding that can be built.

We all have two lines. One leads within, to God. One leads out to the material world and other beings around us. We choose how to open those lines. In my view, the vast majority of people, no matter how religious sounding, have an oil pipeline to the outside world and a copper thread to God. And, though we are not being fed instructions to assasinate, only to assimilate, we are much like the Manchurian Candidate, ever searching for the real truth and struggling to find it and communicate, knowing it's there somewhere. We feel the pull, but until we let the truth find us, there is no resolve or direction.

In my own life, I found that by listening to those barely audible messages, they got louder and I got happier. It did cause me to restrict up on the pipeline, and that does have a cost. In my case, I think probably in all, it's well worth it. No amount of social standing or money was ever comparable to the inner happiness. There is a price to pay for everything, a price to pay for inner peace and a price to pay for "success". But every great teacher we have ever had has said that it's the inner peace route, not the material route, that is the true goal. So, I'm gonna go w/ Buddah & Jesus.

Anyway, I heartily recommend the DVD, if, for no other reason, than to see the "political pundits", actually artists, discuss profound issues such as whether our culture is becoming too "gangsta", or too apathetic. Probably both, but I also think there is hope we could see another age of aquarius enlightenment-type 60's, but a slow burn, mellower thing. The 60's was like the trailer, a little peek of all to come. The real deal could start. We've got the 9/11/war/Big Co. takeover issue to mobilize folks if we could get a spark lit. We have the internet still infiltrating. I guess the wild card is the kids, you start drafting these puppies and all hell is gonna break loose, I guarantee it, cause these kids are hooked up. and their parents aren't WWII relics. We're boomers and some of us do remember.

Bond ReBourne

I ususally don't like Cold War spy stories, because they did much to exacerbate ill will during the actual, horrible, Cold War. But, the Cold War is over, Russia is doing relatively well, as are most of Capitalism's new converts, at least the non war-torn ones. I like Capitalism the way Locke envisioned it, the invisible hand having the power. The invisible hand is the collective will of many individuals acting, basically, in their own self interest, doing what they are interested in, if not what they love. If I ever saw Capitalism working the way it should, I would be very happy. And, there are sectors that function well. But, our USA snapback, we won the cold war so we can now screw the poor over the top approach is also crumbling.

What tends to defeat optimal operation is restricted distribution channels and sleepy, bought, governments. We get all our crap at Wal-mart, eat Big Food (see Super-Size post 12/13/04), take Big Drugs and listen to Big Music all because they are advertized on Big TV, which is what Americans watch. Truly local radio & televsion, like mom & pop, or even mid-sized stores and restauraunts just can't compete with the economies of scale afforded to those able to achieve critical mass in terms of size. They can never operate as cheaply as big companies, which are powerful enough to buy and sell in massive quantity & have the rules swing their way. We let these companies amass power and then they argue, quite convincingly, that we can't afford to have them fail. What's Big Music's plea? "Oh, save our jobs". Big Timber, Steel, Tobacco... they all use it. Then, we subsidize them. Trump fumbled his way into bankruptcy, but the banks bailed him out because he was too big to let fail. We bail out Chrysler, the S&L's & many more in less visible ways.

This bigness is exactly what made Communism fall and it's ailing our own economy. Even though we still have enough base to support the top now, we are becoming increasingly top-heavy. We'll soon start seeing major chinks as it sorts out who's going to take care of the health of this sick nation. You can only screw people so far, then they become dependant.

The movie itself, other than the Capitalism angle, is nothing I would have written blog about, until I saw, yes, the commentary track. The director, Paul Greengrass, expressed such depth and understanding of, not only the film technically, which you always get. or of the acting, which you sometimes get, but, the social and politcal context, which you hardly ever get (giving me lots of turf to trod). This guy went through a whole analysis of how James Bond represents this traditional view of man, who was tough and sure and didn't need to question or feel and how Bourne represents the new man, willing to feel and question, somewhat lost but honest and brave, willing to face fear in a way Bond never would.

So then I went into the whole name thing, Bond suggests something sturdy, steadfast & true. Jason Bourne certainly seems like a modern twist on the name, same initials, but the name suggests birth, modernity. Hence my cute title above. In the end, I had to agree, you could certainly analyze the two classic Cold War spies in terms not only of economic and political change over the past 50 years, but the changes in what men expect from themselves and each other, particularly relative to women.

I do agree that men seem more willing today to question, but most of them still have a much harder time accessing emotion than women. And this comes from a man, by the way, who put it in those terms, but, I think that is it. It's not that they don't feel or care, they just don't have as many connectors. Women sponge it all up, with men, it has to go through channels. I think that, and a variety of other factors, may always make it somewhat hard for men and women to relate to each other, but it's still the best. Get too many women together and it's like the emotional Apocalypse, but too many guys don't do much better. I love men, but I think a lot of people don't relate well to the opposite sex. I think there is a lot of misunderstanding and distrust and lack of common interest. I mean why do so few women really love sex & music the way men do? I can understand why the guys don't go in for make-up or whatever, but sex & music are universally good, aren't they??

The executives around here are supposedly new male, went to college, grad school, early work with women Now, they know a few women who've risen into their ranks, but their wives & women in their community - all from Stepford, er Stanford, whatever. It's not the new deal. Meet the old boss same as the new boss. Did we get fooled again? Is this new male, old male, lost male, stale male... what? Cause these women, if anything, seem the worse for the early uppage. It just makes it more frustrating for them now. Bottom line, we still view the care of one's own children as essentially a self gratification and not a contribution to society. Even when it is considered work, it's the absolute lowest grade. Cultures are typically evaluated in large part on the status of women and though the status of women has steadily risen in this country, we are definitely very far from any meaningful equality.

Women now earn $.75 to the male dollar, up from $.50, twenty years ago, but still not equality and it also doesn't factor in the millions of women not in the workforce. If you accounted for every full-time mom, ascribing to them what is a typical salary for childcare, I guarantee you the pay rate for women would be right back at $.50. If you look at the very upscale, "progressive" Palo Alto, which charges the highest price per 3BD/2BA home in the country, you'd see more like $.25 women... IF you gave them the 25k mom-salary bone. The average guy around here makes well into the six figures and most of the women earn nothing. Jobs alone, made 74M last year... you do the math....$.25 is very generous. So, if this is the scene in one of the most educated, technically advanced towns in the country... has Bond been reborn?

I guess I'll have to ask my friends in the little male movie group the PA execs go to, where they snicker over T&A in the Bond blowouts and then go home to not have sex with their wives. In my extensive, though not yet exhaustive "research" on single men, I think most are pretty clueless, but, so are most women, many of whom cannot be surpassed in terms of vapidity. However, I have found some very cool men. I guess I would put it this way. Today, and increasingly (though it ebbs and flows), there are opportunities to do more than fit into sexual stereotypes and social strictures. One can make their own way toward being a full human being and thus attract others similarly inclined.