Beware of Good Intentions
And the Passions in their eyes
For None of them can open
The Gates of ParadiseDavid Byrne "The Gates of Paradise"
Pardon my ranting, raving, and rambling. I suppose I have been a little frazzled and as a result, not as coherent as I would like to be. I should not have inflicted my silliness on you.
Following is a rather long quote I saved to my quote file when I was reading Ian McEwan’s "Saturday". It seemed like a rather apt and well put description of a modern phenomenon, and I still like it:
Have his anxieties been making a fool of him? It’s part of the new order, this narrowing of mental freedom, of his right to roam. Not so long ago his thoughts ranged more predictably, over a longer list of subjects. He suspects he’s becoming a dupe, the willing, febrile consumer of news fodder, opininion, speculation and of all the crumbs authorities let fall. He’s a docile citizen, watching Leviathan grow stronger while he creeps under its shadow for protection. …. Does he think he’s contributing something, watching news programmes, or lying on his back on the sofa on Sunday aftrnoons, reading more opinion columns of ungrounded certainties, more long articles about what really lies behind this or that development, or abut what is most surely going to happen next … Either way, it amounts to a consensus of a kind, an orthodoxy of attention, a mild subjucation in itself. Does he think that his ambivalence — if that’s what it really is — excuses him from the general conformity?
No answers, just something else to think about.