The thought of being kept in the dark brings politics to mind. How it effects me directly as a citizen in a low economic standing is like being imprisoned in this cave of shadows. The cave being the controlled mass population and the cave being the system. The way that tax payers dollars are divided have begun to frustrate me. The budget cuts from our schools are ridiculous and I have to thank the people responsible for cutting funds.
It trickles down from the higher ups cooking the books and pocketing god know how many of millions of dollars. Plato's thoughts brings to mind America's politics. What if the smartest, most suited, or the wise have been suppressed by those with large amounts of money & power? In this case I really feel that our society has been subjected to this demise. This reminds me of a very funny line in the hit movie Avatar "now they're just pissing on us without having the courtesy of telling us its rain". When the heck are we going to wake up and see that we are being controlled like puppets? Ignorant bliss may be at hand here. What if a whole society is kept 'in the cave' and those who are able to better themselves are silenced by America's aristocrats?
Here's a thought--Lets keep the poor and the middle class on under wraps by doing things like having city cops ticket citizens on the Municipal Transportation Agency for drinking or eating. All natural things that are needed to sustain the body right? The citizen's dollar is paying for this service and it cycles back to bite them in the rear in. People use the transit system to get to their low paying jobs. How about we cut the funds that go to education so we keep the lower class ignorant. Lets sell dirt cheap crap food to low income communities so we can raise the risk of heart disease, diabetes, and cancers in that group. Yes it is your choice to avoid all this. Yes you can work out of a crap society. YES YOU CAN! Arnold, how do I love thee, let me count the ways.
Not only is this issue becoming more alive to me but I knew how much the fear has been embedded in me when the New York Times wrote a story about San Francisco State University and the budget cuts. My week consisted of showing up for about 30 classes, participating, being attentive to the instructors only to either be turned away or looked out sourly if you waltz in late. God damn it I've been walking up and down stairs, booking across campus, emailing, visiting departments, and trying to sell myself to a system that mind you is taking money from me by the thousands. I understand that a good education must be earned. I understand that I choose to be there. And I also understand that it is in my power to achieve were I want to be in life. But there is a line that must be drawn if it seems like you over enroll and offer next to nothing that is required of us to graduate. You hare a higher education system San Francisco State University! You should be able to think this out thoroughly and use your critical thinking skills to come up with a more feasible plan don't you think? If only these professors knew what was happening or least try to remember that the budget cuts are killing our alternatives.
I have gone off on a crazy tangent but I really do feel that America's education system is part of some money conspiracy of those who are more knowledgeable of where the tax payers dollar REALLY goes. Maybe I don't know enough to pass judgment on the shadows that are caste on the walls. But this system seems to be a bit corrupt and what we should be informed is kept in the dark. We bills being passed that have hidden articles that relieve those responsible to stray away from what they should be held responsible for.
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ReplyDeleteGood rant. One quick compositional note first: in blogs, separate your ideas into short paragraphs, with an extra space between each. We've become used to viewing text and absorbing information online in short, separated bits, and this will help you communicate your ideas to your readers.
ReplyDeleteYou cover a lot of ground here (not a bad thing for the free-write format of this medium), so to give you a focused response I'm going to narrow in not so much on your subject matter of societal illusion, governmental incompetency, etc, but on the sharp feelings of frustration and indignation these give you.
Remember in class when I was talking about my early college dabblings in anarchism? Much of that was fueled by similar feelings. I can't say that over a decade later I'm any less frustrated or indignant haha, but one hard lesson I learned from it, and still have to remind myself of all the time, is that it's harder to think straight when the mind and emotions are that combustive. I think this may be one of the main reasons MLK and Gandhi proponed non-violent protests, not just because violence begets violence (which does not relate to your topic here), but also because it inhibits if not cripples the victimized party. It's often more difficult for us to work out an effective or level-headed response to the injustices we see in the world when our minds and heart are full of energy bouncing around with no outlet or place to go.
When it comes to how to respond then, the pertinent questions become not only how do we deal with the frustration which seems to be our system's instinctual way of reacting, and, moreover, even after we have dealt with that, what then is the right/effective/healthy/beneficial way to address grievances that have such a pervasive effect on us such as the ones you're pointing out here. There's of course not one way to answer either of these questions, but they are vital concerns to spend time mulling over. Among a number of movies that treat these connected issues of injustices, frustration, responses etc, the first and most powerful which comes to mind is THX-1138. Robert Duvall's title character delivers one of the most affecting performances of the kind existentially anxiety that anyone striving to become conscious and conscientious has to work through, and the way that he achieves this makes for a great representation of what escaping the cave takes, and means. "Boys in the Hood" also deals with very similar themes, from a quite different angle, Another movie treating this topic in a humorous way is "Living in Oblivion", which deals with frustrations in one's personal life and at work etc. Let me know if you'd like to discuss any of these, or another movie or topic.
JM
Thanks for the compositional suggestion. It does look like it would have a better flow for the reader. I've always been afraid of starting a new paragraph for fear of being wrong. That too and I was really upset with the budget cuts so it just felt right to keep typing. I thought it was hilarious to re-read my blog because I can't believe how unsettled I sound. Utilizing these emotions to help me build a better view/argument in my paper will definitely helpful.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, as far as focusing on the outlets and reactions that we have to being suppressed in society socially & politically, I really feel that your movie suggestions are good. I still do feel strongly about two movies in particular though, Pleasantville and V for Vendetta. I just remember watching Pleasantville and relating to the characters and their pain being so far beyond words that it mentally and emotionally crippled them. Expectations that surround us can be so absurd at times and I really do feel like that it would be a great source for the direction I want to take.