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Beyond Eternity 03
BEYOND ETERNITY ISSN 1203-5416
Episode 03 <--> February 1996
Sanjay Singh eternity@cyberspace.org
_______________________________________________________________
"It wouldn't be too hard to assume that you were a
depression-racked paranoid loony. Not so much from this
issue, but as a general pattern from earlier issues.
I've learnt, though. You're not paranoid." [Julian
Barton]
And that's how my afternoon began. I came back from class,
and did the routine check of the mailbox. My housemates got bills,
I got a letter from a friend of mine telling me that. That's when
I knew it was going to be a good weekend. I had something to set
the mood, which was all that I needed.
I was actually nervous about this weekend. It was only a
couple of days until the end of the month, and I really didn't have
too much written for this issue. So I figured that I'd be
frantically scanning the newspapers, looking for something that
would anger (or confuse, I guess for me it works either way) me
into writing a commentary about it. Instead, I get Julian's
article, which you'll find somewhere down the line, and the
inspiration to just sit down, drop a tape into the player, and just
start stroking the keyboard.
If you think this issue is a little shorter than some of my
more recent ones, you're right. The ten page minimum was a little
overzealous on my part. I did keep it going for a while (five or
six months perhaps), but I think I prefer it this way. It's a
little smaller, and a lot saner for me.
I guess there's really not too much more to say here. Enjoy
the issue (couldn't come up with a good metaphor, sorry).
Contents
========
- Introduction (you just read it)
- Devil In Brown Wingtips
- Phil At Night
- Winners And Losers
- We Are Not Alone
- The Price Of Convenience [by Julian Barton]
- Administrivia
- Rules Of The Game
Devil In Brown Wingtips
=======================
"There's not much more to tell than that. Winter's wet,
the sky is blue, and old Satan Clause, Jimmy, he's out
there, and he's just getting stronger." [The Last Boy
Scout]
Here we are. It's Monday, it's January, and it's 1996. I
finally managed to end my streak of waking up before ten o'clock
every day (I can't even remember when the last time I slept in past
ten was). So here we are. It's a new year, for whatever that's
worth (still don't think it's worth celebrating), and I just
thought I'd share some little insights that I gleaned from last
night's festivities.
Recently I've realized that maybe there is a God. My only
explanation for this one is that to have the devil, you need to
have a god that balances things out, and recent experiences have
pointed pretty heavily in the direction that Satan is out there.
My entire basis for the devil's existence, however, hinges on
one tiny piece of evidence. The wingtip. Now, I know absolutely
nothing about women's shoes, but as far as my sphere of knowledge
is concerned these have got to be the single most uncomfortable
thing to put on your feet.
I think the only way to get a size that you're sure will be
comfortable, would be to get one with three or four inches of
headroom at the tip. The problem with that is that they look
really stupid that way, and you end up tripping over everything
when you walk around. And if you don't have any laces on your shoe
(which I don't), you have no choice but to buy something that fits
a little tightly, just so it stays on.
It just doesn't make any sense. I thought men's wear was
supposed to be comfortable. I thought we were driven by instinct.
I thought comfort was king. Isn't that why we have remote
controls? So we won't have to keep getting up and changing the
channels every time a commercial comes on?
I know I can't be the first person to have noticed this, but
in a society that uses a talking head for a figure head, and a
cushy recliner as it's throne, why haven't we figured out how to
make a dress shoe comfortable?
It's so simple that somebody must have figured it out. Maybe
the information hasn't gotten around to me yet. Some things never
change...
Life still isn't making too much sense. It's a lot better now
that I've started to keep track of it, but there's still a lot of
legwork to be done. The bad guys are still just past the horizon,
but at least they're running away from us now.
Phil At Night
==============
"Liberty means responsibility. That is why most mean
dread it." [George Bernard Shaw]
Last night was phil-night, meaning that I had my philosophy
course. It just started, so we're still working with the early
material. It's a course in 'critical thinking' and right now we're
working on argument structures. The Shaw quote was one of our
examples. So far everything makes sense, and life is good. Yay!
This is the problem. It seems that a large chunk of the class
forgets that it is an example, and we begin to get into a really
warped (and lengthy) 'philosophical' debate on the validity of the
first sentence. The one about liberty meaning responsibility.
Personally, I think the two are pretty much interchangeable.
You can't have responsibility without liberty, and you can't have
liberty without responsibility (unless you have anarchy, which is
a bad thing). The problem was this, no one else liked this way of
thinking. Everyone seemed to think that liberty was a good thing,
and that everyone wants it, while responsibility is just something
that people treat indifferently; either you have it or you don't.
This is where I got scared. Like I said, anarchy is a bad
thing, but everyone seemed perfectly happy with shameless hedonism.
So, since this is my soapbox, I thought that it would be a good
place to try to 'fix' this error in thinking. I'll try not to
sound like a textbook.
Why do you need responsibility for liberty? I've always
thought that freedom was a privilege, not a right. And now on top
of that I've learned that it's a choice as well. But with any
choice comes the responsibility for that choice. If there were no
consequences, nothing would happen... ever.
To earn freedom you have to be willing to take the
responsibility for your actions. The most fundamental freedom that
anyone can have is freedom of choice. You can choose if you want
any of the other freedoms. Pretty simple really. Live for
yourself, for others, or not at all.
The only way completely escape responsibility is to never make
a decision. Just sit in a darkened corner and let someone else
decide what's best for you. It worked when we were just kids...
but then again, we always hated the fact that what we said was
ignored. Especially when we were right.
Another problem with the 'darkened corner' is that no one
wants to be there. We just seem to live in this perpetual fear of
being taken out of the loop. We need to be surrounded by 'news'.
The form doesn't matter, we'll take fact (if you can find it),
gossip, or even small talk. As long as we know our information
dealer will keep on giving us our 'fix' then we're set.
If you don't believe me, think about how you'd react if I told
you that I just didn't want to be in the loop any more. I just
want to cut myself off from the rest of the world. No more news,
no more information, no more juicy tidbits of what's going on in
the outside world. I can promise you that I'd overwhelmingly see
those "you're insane" looks (which I'm all too familiar with).
The only way to be truly free is to take responsibility for
your actions. If you're not responsible, then someone else is, and
the person with the most at stake will always be the one pulling
the strings.
This is the beauty of the entire system. When you accept
freedom and embrace the responsibility for it, you also get to take
full credit for your life. The added bonus is that this means that
you get the seat behind the wheel. You're in control!
Don't get me wrong though. I'm not saying that collectivism
is useless. I'm just saying that for the group to be strong, the
people inside it have to be strong. It takes many to create
paradise, but you only need one to tear it down.
Winners And Losers
==================
"This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be
Good, great and joyous, beautiful and free;
This is alone Life, Joy, Empire and Victory."
[Percy Bysshe Shelly]
The first time I read George Orwell's "1984" was two years
ago. People kept on telling me about how good it was, and I had
heard enough about the adventures of Big Brother (inside and
outside of the novel) that I just couldn't resist any more. I
bought the book. I read the book. I liked the book. I hated the
ending.
It was just one of the least satisfying endings that I had
ever read. It just ended, exactly where it began. (If you're
planning on reading it, you might not want to read too much more of
this.) The story didn't accomplish anything. I just felt empty
inside. This wasn't an ending. I had to be missing something.
You can't just write three hundred pages and not allow anything to
change. What about character development?
I suppose you could say that Winston's character did grow. He
kept on getting stronger and stronger as the novel progressed...
but why destroy him in the end? What ever happened to good beating
evil? About one man being able to make a difference? Wasn't that
what 'real' writing was all about? Celebrating success and triumph
over failure and apathy? I just didn't get it.
Then, I found the ending I was looking for. I got a copy of
"Anthem" by Ayn Rand. It was written three years before "1984",
and I found far too many similarities between the two.
I have a friend that normally plays a little game with me. I
complain about how paranoid Oliver Stone is and he complains about
how there are only a small handful of plots, that books and movies
keep on borrowing from. One of his favourite examples is with
Orwell's lack of creativity. I'm not sure if he's right about
this. The only two Orwell books that I've read were "1984" and
"Animal Farm", and I'll admit, they are the same book, just with
different characters, but at least the idea of how dangerous a
totalitarian society could be to itself was original. He's going
to explode when I lend Anthem to him. It seems that Rand beat
Orwell to the punch. And at least her story had an ending.
Anthem is about a world where the status quo is everything.
Everything is done for the greater good. Even the word "I" has
been eliminated from the language. The main character wasn't even
given the courtesy of a name. He was just "Equality 7-2521". No
more, no less.
In under a hundred pages, Rand gives a 'reason to believe'.
Instead of brutally explaining why you can't beat the system, she
gives us a character that tried to help the system, was rejected,
and then escaped from it. And guess what... He succeeded.
For what seems to be the most referenced book of the past ten
years, "1984" seems to be lacking a lot. Everytime censorship
rears its ugly, little head, everyone starts commenting on how
we're getting one step closer to Big Brother, and the audience just
nods their heads, swallowing it all in. It does make the point,
but it is severely inaccurate. Carry the analogy further and you
remember that Big Brother won. Is the message really "who cares
about the war, just get a victory and appear on Oprah"? No thanks,
I think I'll pass. It's time to set a new standard... Even if it
is fifty years old.
No more anti-hero. No more useless role models who when given
a taste of independence, they trip, stumble, and land a few steps
behind where they started. No more blind visionaries, who have "a
dream" but no clue how to turn it into a reality. No more losers.
They just get in the way.
The Price Of Convenience
========================
"In reading your 'belief' about dishwashers, I thought
I'd add this piece I wrote a while ago..." [Julian
Barton]
Normally when I hear a message about the environment, I
change the channel. This time I didn't. Maybe it's the
first time the argument made sense. Or at least was
explained intelligently. I guess you don't need
statistics to make a point...
by: Julian Barton
Fossil fuels will run out soon. So we're told anyway, and I
for one am not heading down some undersea hole to check. It's best
if they don't run out, we're told. Maybe we should be a little
careful in our use of them. We sit there and nod sagely at the TV
presenter as he tells us this. The adverts come on. First one is
for one of those companies who make power tools. We no longer have
to sweep the leaves, it says. They have come up with this really
neat garden helper. Like a vacuum cleaner, but backwards - it
blows the leaves into a pile. Saves me all that sweeping, and sore
back too. Great, although I have my doubts on whether my back
would prefer me to sweep or bend over lugging one of these things.
Looking a little closer at one of these nifty machines draws
some obvious points to mind. It has to use some kind of power to
create this air current, and it does. It's got a little gas tank
at the back - just pour in the two stroke, and it creates a nice
artificial wind to move your leaves.
Shows just how much we care about oil shortages and all that
stuff.
It's not that hard to sweep leaves, people have been doing it
for centuries just fine. Now, however, we need one of these
contraptions to save us the effort.
Watched a guy using one the other day. It wasn't any quicker
than a broom, but it did look impressive. Which is what counts,
since he was a professional lawn mower.
I thought about this as I rode to work yesterday. Past all
these cars banked up in traffic. Cars which, for the most part,
had one person in them.
The idea of car-pooling is nothing new, I thought. I'm not
being all that original in wondering why people don't ride bikes,
take buses or some such. People have been saying it for years.
The roads were still so packed with cars that I would have
beaten most of them to work.
Terrible thing, this oil shortage.
In a similar vein is water. I live in a city which
effectively has summer nine months of the year. Great, except for
a water shortage for six of those.
We're constantly reminded to conserve water, with good reason.
I was at one of the dams a few weeks back, in the 'winter' period,
and it was pretty low. I wouldn't even take even money on there
being enough water in there to break a ten foot fall.
So it's a dry city - so what?
Well, although those nifty air-broom things are taking market
share, they still have a long way to catch up with the market
leader. Garden hoses.
You see, a hose delivers a pretty good blast of water if you
hold it right (or get a special nozzle). So you can sweep the
entire driveway without moving at all with a good hose. So what do
people use?
Old neighbour of mine - every night, he watered his concrete,
the pavement too. Had to keep those leaves off, you see.
You say water's scarce too?
Administrivia...
================
Beyond Eternity (ISSN 1203-5416) is a monthly serial that is
written (for the most part) and compiled by Sanjay Singh, and then
edited by the amazing duo of Paul Sheen and Sanjay Singh. You can
find older (or even current) issues from any of these places...
mail: eternity@cyberspace.org
web: http://www.interlog.com/~vash
ftp: ftp.etext.org: /pub/Zines/Eternity/
gopher: gopher.etext.org (follow the prompts)
usenet: alt.zines
subscriptions: Just send me mail, I'll add you to the list. All I
ask is that you let me know what you think about
"Beyond Eternity...", and you can even mention how
you found out about it. It's a small price to pay,
but that's all I ask for.
As always, if you have a question, comment, statement, rant,
or anything, feel free to let me know. (Who knows, you might even
feel better that you did it.) There's always room for me to
improve, and there's always room for outside contributions. When
I say that one person can make a difference, that includes you.
Rules Of The Game
=================
I take full responsibility of the overall content here. There
might be other writers but what goes into this is my choice.
Copyright is held by whoever wrote the article, and if it doesn't
say who they were, then it was me. I'd strongly suggest asking
them for permission before you reprint anything that was written in
here (this includes my stuff). Chances are that I won't object,
but I'd still like to know.
In past issues of The Eternity Articles, I was asked if what
I had written was true. I'll state this for the record now,
"everything I write is true to me". As for the other writers,
well, you'd have to ask them. As a general rule I'm not going to
print pure fiction any more, unless I think that it has a message
that's worth relaying.
I think that's all that needs to be said. Talk to you next
month.
Sanjay Singh (1/29/96)
