Bill O'Reilly and music videos

Every so often, when I'm flipping through channels, some headline catches my eye when I skip past Fox News, inevitably flipping back to see what the hell these assholes are talking about now. I flip back, missing the end of an interview, having to suffer through Sean Hannity thanking Ann Coulter for being on the program. I'm glad I missed what she said, but I start thinking to myself about these 24-hour news networks. Does anyone else realize that this is a pointless waste of time? That's when I started thinking about the nature of our news. It seems that news really doesn't matter, but exists as a platform for some giant Irish man to yell at people as to why they're wrong. That's the nature of news today. There's no more discourse, no more conversation, no more intelligent debate. Fox News is "fair and balanced?" That's just like saying the Pope is Jewish. It's just not true.

But this phenomenon didn't start with news. It started with a song written 28 years ago by Trevor Horn, Courtney Courson, Geoffrey Downes, and Bruce Woolley. They were better known as The Buggles. "I heard you on the wireless back in Fifty Two. Lying awake intent at tuning in on you. If I was young, it didn't stop you coming through. Oh Oh." We know this song better as "Video Killed The Radio Star," but it might as well be the anthem for news as well as MTV. When this video premiered as MTV commenced on August 1, 1981, no one foresaw the death of music as we know it. For the most part, music is dead. There are songs produced these days that transcend how we listen and experience music, but the love of greed and money that we have today has left its putrid stench on what was once a wonderful experience. When we listen to music, we get a vision. That vision can transport us to a new dimension of life; it reminds us of times spent in the past, whether in a kitchen or a foreign country ("Don't Speak" by No Doubt sends me straight back to France), and music will continue to exist in this capacity.

Just like the newspaper. When we read articles, it forces our mind to receive new information that is forced to react to our own emotions and feelings. Granted, the news has gotten worse and worse in the last six years, but we can still formulate an opinion based on articles that we read. Whether positive or negative, we can think about it. Fox News tells you how to think. They will appraise you if you're "right" (like Ann Coulter, who said that we must invade foreign countries, kill their leaders, and convert them to Christianity), and they will yell at you until red in the face if you're "wrong" (like Jeremy Glick, the son of a Port Authority worker slain on 9/11, who was yelled at by Bill O'Reilly, told to shut up, then had his mic cut and was thrown out of the studio. You can see it for yourself on YouTube.) They constantly plant a vision into the minds of mostly uneducated America about what is right and what is wrong. Anyone reading this who agrees with Fox News, let me ask you a question: Do you like being treated like a child, or do you like to make up your own mind? Read the paper, form an opinion, think for yourself.

Peace.

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Writing with a purpose?

It seems that pens are going ridiculously quickly out of style. I can't even fathom how far we have come as a race (the human race), that pens and pencils are becoming more and more obsolete. I just got out of my Sociology Final, pumping the sky as I beat the shit out of that test like it owed me money. But now I'm stuck on the objective of writing, which has never been a difficult goal, only I procrastinate until the cows come home. I also use bad cliches like "until the cows come home" until the cows come home.

But, I digress.

I really have no idea what to write about, except that words in a blog, or notebook, or journal, or diary, serve a much greater purpose than the ones floating around in my head. Which got me thinking about the nature of thinking. If you ask someone who the current president is, they will say "George W. Bush." But do they actually think the words, "OK, who is the president? It's George W. Bush. Time to answer"? Because if someone asked me who the current president is, in my head would be heard, quite loudly, moaning and groaning in utter disgust of what the correct answer to the question is. Right now, you're reading words on a screen, but it really doesn't mean anything, and this blog really doesn't mean anything. I could write anything down here, and you're still reading it. I could say that, sociologically speaking, the fact that I merely attend college automatically makes me smarter than more than half of the country. It's true, look it up. I really stopped writing with a purpose a long time ago, and it's clear that I need a sense of structure or discipline in my writing, as writing is sacred. The thought of language and the idea that we have a communication system on universally (or not so much) recognized symbols create words, and these words, put in the right order, can change the world. Just like the Gettysburg Address, just like the Treaty of Versailles, just like Hamlet, just like the works of Plato and Aristotle and Nietzsche and so on and so forth, they're just words. Words on a page. Whether you like these words or not, you have used these words before, and the order in which you use them makes all the difference. There will never be a time where no one can say anything without repeating something in the past. It's this thought that led to the quote "Those who don't understand history are doomed to repeat it." This is the reason why so many events in history have repeated themselves, just like Vietnam and Iraq. I seek no approval in the words I say, because I have freedom of speech. It wasn't given to me by a mayor, or a president, or a God for that matter. It was given to me by a document. My ability to make words was given to me by a page filled with words. And I'm going to say what I want, whenever I want, however I want. If you don't like it, make some words of your own. The point is that we can all express emotion.

So let it out.

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