I seems to me that we are not very good at disagreeing. You see this come up over and over. The basis is this notion that disagreement is a form of war and that winning is what matters. War makes things so easy because they are black and white: if we don't kill them they'll kill us. Not a lot of reason to debate in such a context. However, most disagreement is not war and to treat it as such turns potential allies into enemies and cripples the healthy process of intellectual debate.
An easy example is partisan political institutions such as the American congress. These guys to go war everyday because they want their side to win. They are not interested in furthering our understanding of issues and the problems and solutions that they contain. There is a very small handful of congress-persons who actually vote the issues, and the majority of the debate is focused on these brave souls. The rest of the monkeys vote their party so their side can win. The big obvious problem here is that you create a situation where not everyone can win. Once you take sides, one side's victory is the other side's failure. I believe that almost every issue, if not every issue, has a solution where all people can win. This requires that you assume this is possible and partisanship excludes this possibility. We need people with more courage. People who are willing to think, learn and debate. People who are willing to accept that their position on an issue can be improved. Some of you are saying: yeah, but some issues ARE black and white. Example: either we drill for oil in Alaska or we don't, right? Wrong. The issue in this case is not whether we drill in Alaska or not, the issue is energy policy. If you think for a minute that our energy policy depends soley on the issue of drilling in Alaska or not, you are not thinking very clearly. We have turned ANWAR into a partisan issue because we are not brave enough to debate the bigger issue of energy policy. We like partisan issues because then the battle lines are drawn and we can fight a conventional war. Non-partisan debate requires much more work and much more courage. You are simple minded if you think ANWAR is the answer to our energy policy and you are simple minded if you think that the world will end if we do drill in Alaska. This is not a black and white issue and we all lose when we reduce it to one.
Another obvious example is the current crisis in the Middle East. If you ask the Arabs, the Israelies are completely wrong. If you ask the Israelies, the Arabs are completely wrong. There is never the slightest hint from either side that they are willing to examine their own position. If you question the Israelies, you are an anti-Semite. If you question the Arabs you are anti-Muslim. C'mon. You're both right and you're both wrong. It takes courage to examine the middle path -- a courage that so far both sides have lacked. It is not possible for you to kill each other so completely that the issues dissolves. In this case disagreement has literally turned into bloodshed because of partisan thinking. The Palestinians and the Israelies must enjoy the living hell they create every day because otherwise the courageous and peaceful people in the middle would have their say.
I read about another example of destructive disagreement in the paper today, regarding the controversial book Harmful to Minors. Many people hate this book. They think it is evil, or more rationally, simply dangerously incorrect. Others think it is a valid, well-researched work that furthers a subject considered by many too taboo to write about. These people disagree and there is nothing wrong with that. However, the people that think the book is "evil" have taken the issue out of the realm of healthy debate and into the realm of partisan warfare. They want the book banned and burned and the people that produced punished. They are not content with being outspoken opponents of the premise of the book, they need to destroy it. I can't help but ask: why? What is it that makes a person so vilify a book (in this case) they the want to destroy it entirely? There are many explanations based on the lack of logic applied by these people, but if we seek a logical explanation only one occurs to me: they see the book as the attacker, trying to destroy them, and their only defense is to act in kind.
Here, then, is the crux of the matter. All of the participants in partisan warfare see the other as the aggressor. They are the well-meaning victims of the violence of others and they have been forced to fight fire with fire.
If this is true one could easily give up hope and see this constant conflict as unfortunately inevitable forever and ever. However, there have been courageous individuals who have given us reason to think otherwise. It is possible to disagree without destruction, all it takes is courage. Ghandi used the powerful phrase "non-violent resistance". Even outside the realm of physical violence this is an apt phrase. You can disagree without warfare. You can be the one to be wronged without wronging. You can give comfort to the prostitutes and the tax collectors, as Jesus did, without condemnation. You can be calm in the chaos like Buddha did. You can have a dream like Martin Luther King, Jr. did. You can die for these ideas because it is better than killing for them. We have taken an eye for an eye for so long that we are all blind. We have fought fire with fire until the world is a raging inferno. It's not working, folks. Put away your sword. Disagree, debate, discuss, believe, argue and convince but do not destroy.
It may seem that I have leaped a little to far with this -- how did we get from partisan debate to Buddha? We got here because it is the core of the issue. You are weak if you need to destroy those that disagree with you. You are a coward if you turn disagreement into warfare. At home, in the office, on the Internet, in church -- wherever you interact with your fellow humans you have a duty to learn to disagree without destruction so as to keep win-win situations possible. If you really are right, your argument needs your enemies to survive to see the light. As soon as healthy debate turns into dogmatic warfare, you've already lost.
Power is a funny thing. Modern "power" is manifested in things like money, politics and business. From Bill Gates to George Bush to your boss, we perceive power in things non-physical. Your boss's power over you does not come from her ability to beat you up. This is a good thing. As civilization has evolved, we have learned to perceive power in many different things. I can imagine as early man roamed the earth 10,000 years ago they began to recognize in each other the growing spark of intelligence. Thus began the struggle between physical and non-physical power.
In one sense, might is right. There are no referees enforcing the rules on this planet. All we have is what we agree to. We have agreed over the centuries that societies benefit the common good. That is, of course, the very point of socialization and history shows us in no uncertain terms that a society of people has power that supercedes any one individuals power. Regardless, the rules are an agreement between us and, ultimately, they are enforced through the use of physical power. Law enforcement has a keen word for physical power: deadly force. Other forms of physical power are called murder and war. Every day including this one will be full of acts of physical power in these and other forms. Since the times of the earliest proto-humans, we have been killing each other every day. But clearly non-physical power is much more common, even in violent areas of the world. The structures of family, business, society and government are voluntarily honored a trillion times a day.
This struggle between physical and non-physical power is important. There is a very serious "bottom line" in the interactions with humans. If push comes to shove, someone might kill you. If you abuse non-physical power you may drive people to the point of forgoeing our "agreement" and start using physical power. An example would be something like the French Revolution. Here the aristocrats abuse the hell out of physical and non-physical power to the point that people grabbed them and cut their heads off. In other unfortunate cases, an employee blows his boss away. Our society judges these acts with little consistancy. Who was left to try and convict the French Revolutionaries? No one. The rules had been changed. The disgruntled employee is generally not so lucky. Said another way, if enough agree with a given application of physical violence, it is condoned. War often blurs this line. For example, what the hell is a war crime? War is barbaric, premeditated killing. What makes one act of killing a war crime and another act not? The answer is simple: the victors write the rules.
Physical power plays a daily role in our lives. It seems unfortunate in a way, but it is also the Great Equalizer. I am a peace-loving person, but I think it would do well for all people to remember not to abuse non-physical power, lest you be the victim of physical power.
Michael
I'm into amateur astronomy. It's a hobby that gives me immense enjoyment. An interesting dichotomy presents itself as one gets more immersed in the universe. On the one hand, you have the world around us -- our jobs, cars, relationships, and all of that other fun stuff. On the other you have a universe that appears to go on without end, with billions of stars, galaxies, nebulas, quasars, and all sorts of interesting phenomena. One the one hand, you have our real world, and on the other you have the *real* real world. Because in the context of the universe, we barely exist. Our planet is tiny and barely visible from our own outer solar system. The earth is a collection of heavy elements that coalesced from the remnants of a supernova millions of years ago. Whether we achieve peace on earth or nuke ourselves into oblivion, the universe goes on unaffected. No matter how long you live, what great works you achieve, no matter how deep you love or hate, it is all irrelevant in the eyes of the universe. The earth will be gone in a few billion years no matter what we do, as the sun slowly exhausts its nuclear potential.
Some might find that depressing. I do not. I love the "real world" of the universe around us. I am fascinated by the slow (in our terms) evolution of interstellar matter -- of the cosmic dance that combines, expands, contracts and gives and takes life. The true nature of the universe is of a scale that is impossible to truly grasp in the human mind. Time scales are measured in billions of years. Distances are measured in light years -- a unit equal to roughly 5,865,700,000,000 miles. The next nearest star to ours is over 4 times that far away. The nearest galaxy is several billion times farther away. The universe is huge and ancient and is the truest miracle of the Great Spirit. I do not feel diminished by this fact, I feel exalted. The matter in my body right now has existed since the beginning of time, and will continue to exist until the end of time. I have been stars, air, iron, and water. I am a child of the universe.
So are you.
I come from a family of teachers -- people who have been paid next to nothing to teach your children how to read, write, reason, create, and function on our society. These people are among the most kind-hearted, dedicated, and intelligent people I have ever met. They are as committed to excellence as any professional athlete or successful business person. It's outrageous to me that they are so often blamed for the ills of our education system, and yet so seldom are they empowered to improve them. Somehow school boards, politicians, and white-trash upper-middle-class parents have a better understanding of our education needs than teachers. Thank god a teacher shortage is growing so we can all step back and revalue the importance of teachers.
Teachers are experts at education, just like doctors are experts at health care. Patients seldom fight with their doctor about who knows more about their health problems. People pay doctors to be experts, and they trust their knowledge and experience. Teachers deal with the problems of education every day. They know that things like merit pay(1), high-stakes tests(2), and voucher programs(3) are dumb ideas that fight the wrong problems. They know that nothing influences a child's appetite for learning like positive, supportive reinforcement at home, and top-notch teachers and facilities at school. So many schools fight for every dollar as if they were a charity. So many parents side with their children on school behavioral issues. Imagine walking into of a doctor's office and arguing with your doctor in front of your children about what's what. Imagine shouting down your doctor because you want the ulcer to be gas instead. You, me, and everyone around us has to start treating teachers with the utmost respect and deference in matters of education.
Money helps. Businesses know they can do more, and be stronger organizations, with more money. Schools do not directly generate income, so all of their money (in public schools) comes from the government. You hear people say stupid things like "throwing money at the problem won't help.". Bullshit. Go tell a corporation how more money won't help. Do you know any businesses that feel they are better able to do their work with less income? Hell no. Money helps in a lot of ways. First and foremost, we need to try to attract the best possible candidates for teaching positions. Think back to a teacher you had that really got you fired up about learning. Now think back to one that made learning suck. Just like every other profession, regardless of the other upsides of the job, higher paychecks attract more candidates, which allows school systems to be more selective. Teachers are important. We should feel good about paying them lots of money. We should also outfit our schools with whatever it takes to get kids fired up about coming in and learning stuff. Kids love science museums -- these fun little laboratories made just for them. Schools should be fun laboratories where kids can work together and be instructed on all sorts of fun stuff. One example I use is the music business. A lot of kids are interested in music. By using the music business as the paradigm, I could get kids crawling over each other to learn about:
Science -- electricity, digital media, acoustics, electromagnetics, and electronics, all of which involve math; Writing -- business plans involving persuasive writing, organized presentation, and creative composition Reading -- industry trade magazines, history of music, history of recording, technical manuals Arts -- making and recording music, package design, marketing, criticism.
Let me teach that class to 16 year old dropouts and they'll all come every day. There are lots of other examples. Most adults think science is boring -- what are your kids going to think? Should we make them suffer through science like you did, remembering almost nothing? Or should we consider a new curriculum where the driving force is focus on learning as a fun and useful lifestyle. It starts with teachers.
(1) Merit pay is dumb because there is no way to accurately measure how well a teacher is performing. All merit pay programs put forward thus far have looked at test scores and other measurable criteria to determine "merit". Until we can measure teaching performance in a way that actually reflects the objective skills of a teacher, we cannot risk implementing merit pay. I think we should pay great teachers more than shitty teachers, but the real goal is to not have shitty teachers. I suggest that we let teachers decide how their pay scale is graduated. Teachers are against merit pay.
(2) So-called high-stakes tests (where failing the test means not graduating or advancing) furthers the ill-conceived notion that you are "educated" if you can cough up facts. Memory is an important part of applied intelligence, but most people would argue not the most important, perhaps by far. We have succeeded in educating a student when we have taught them how fun and rewarding learning is. Once that fire is lit, the real goal of education fulfills itself. The kids that fail are the ones that haven't been let in on the fact that learning is one of the most fun things you can do. The three R's are important parts of education, but you can't teach a kid a single R without his or her cooperation. It is pennies on the dollar to do everything in our power to teach kids to love to learn. High-stakes tests make kids like learning less. Teachers can do a much better job of evaluating the education of a student than state-mandated tests can. Plain and simple. The state should set education goals, but in a broader context. Let's get more kids staying in school and more kids going on to higher education.
(3) Voucher programs are dumb because they take money out of the public education system. I fully support parents' rights to enroll their children in private schools. I do not support taking money out of the public education system to support it. Some people think the competition for the dollar will make public schools compete more. That thinking makes no sense to me. Competition implies winners and losers. Do we want our public education system to lose that battle? Should we doom more and more children to under-funded educations? We don't have the right to withdraw our tax dollars from the police department if we feel we don't need their services. Public education benefits the community as a whole, and it should be enthusiastically supported by everybody, regardless of whether their children attend it or not. Voucher programs hurt public education and hurt schools that most need the help. Let's fix the problems, not compete against them.
Michael Koppelman
I'd like you to consider, for one moment, the issue of light pollution. My hope is that if you give the issue just a hair of brain power that you'll see what a no-brainer it is.
The saddest part of the story, in my opinion, is that your children will never see the stars, except perhaps on the occasional vacation to the North Woods. They will not stare in silent wonder at the thick swath of the Milky Way's billions of stars. They will not know, as every human for thousands of years has known, the familiar shapes of the constellations. The reason they will not is urban light pollution.
Perhaps light pollution could best be described as wasted light. If you are lighting your driveway, for instance, and 30% of the light shines off into space, you are wasting energy and money. If 20% of it shines on your neighbors house, you are wasting energy and money and being rude at the same time. If you leave outdoor lights on when they are not needed, you are again wasting energy and money.
It is also a fact that lighting intended for security is more effective when turned on by motion detectors. If is less safe to shine the lights all the time than it is to shine them only when needed.
So there are really three great reasons to support a reduction in light pollution:
The three main things you can do to help fight light pollution are:
You don't have to be an amateur astronomer to enjoy the beauty of a dark sky. If you are an amateur astronomer you know all too well how hard it is to find in towns and cities of all sizes. It doesn't have to be that way. Wasted light does no one any good and hurts those of us that enjoy looking at stars, planets, nebula, and the other wonders that twirl above us. It's a no-brainer...
For more information check out the International Dark-Sky Association.
Think about it.
Michael Koppelman
We are unaware of the fact that we benefit daily from centuries of incremental improvement. Absolutely everything we interact with has had years, or decades, or centuries, or millennium of brainpower applied to it. We, as a society, take for granted what was revolutionary at one time. We take as common knowledge what was once the greatest thoughts of the most forward thinking of earlier peoples. Look around the room right now. Everything you see was someone's idea. A chair was a revolutionary concept. It was new. The concept has been improved upon by millions to follow. A fireplace, an ink-jet printer, a candle -- all are intellectual signs of their times. It's funny that we now have a word for it - intellectual property. While decidedly in the public domain, the world that surrounds us represents the 'intellectual property' of humanity.
We've carried this information along with us in various forms. Initially we had only action. We learned by watching. Then words were spoken -- generation after generation of repeating the same words and concepts over and over. Even today we use oral tradition to pass on a great deal of information. Then the printing press, the computer, cd-roms, libraries, schools, colleges, universities, self-help groups, therapists, seminars....the list goes on forever. We have access to the most vast knowledge base and the most advanced learning tools ever conceived of in the history of the world!
And in once sense, we're doing great. Strange as it seems, there is less violent conflict going on in the world now than probably ever. Public opinion -- world wide -- is more enlightened on issues of human rights, equal rights, and non-violent conflict resolution. Territorial and racial wars are declining. War in general is beginning to make less fiscal and political sense. The importance of education, both factual and behavioral, is more widely known.
On the other hand, so few people really devote time to their continuing education. With all the resources we have available, it is crazy to not to keep learning. Even though I consider it a very small part of education, I think everyone should get a college degree. Now matter who you are or how old you are, if you don't have a college degree you should get one. For the simple reason that it gets you up to speed on sort of the 'base' knowledge of our society. It teaches you how to learn things you don't like and gives you a basic understanding of things you would probably not opt to teach yourself. Post-graduate education is awesome, I'm sure, but I don't think more college is necessary to keep learning. There are three simple things you can do to keep learning:
Don't stop now. Even if you are retired from your job it doesn't mean you have to retire from life. You can contribute to the intellectual property of the world. You can help create words and ideas that last forever.
Every chance you get vote in favor of education. Vote for politicians that are proponents of education in fact. Teach your children everything you can get your hands on. Teach them how to love learning. Show them. Show yourself. You are a miracle. Thrive. L E A R N !
Americans should support a unified Ireland. They should support it because they were involved in a very similar situation -- the American Revolution. It is very convenient for the British to consider the IRA terrorists, but the Brits of the 1700's thought American Revolutionaries to be criminals as well. Were they correct? It depends, I'm sure, on who you ask...
For those that don't know, the conflict in Northern Ireland is not religious in nature. To my understanding (and please correct me if I'm wrong), the Troubles, as they are called, are the continuation of the centuries-old conflict between the Irish and the British. England was largly Catholic until King Henry (the 8th?) decided to make his own Church more to his liking. Thus the Church of England was born. Thus the Protestants in Northern Ireland are mainly English or of English loyalty, and the Catholics are mainly Irish or of Irish loyalty. England has meddled in Ireland for ages, just like they meddled in America, India, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, etc. In the 1920's Ireland finally managed to negotiate with the British to create the Republic of Ireland (or Southern Ireland), which has sworn loyalty to the Crown, but not to the British government. The Republic of Ireland is similar to Australia in its relationship with England. Northern Ireland was kept as part of the UK called Ulster. The Republic of Ireland gained its freedom due to the efforts of Michael Collins, the Sinn Fein, the IRA, and the traditional component of war -- killing people. The goal of the Sinn Fein and the IRA is a unified independent Ireland, just like the goal of the American Revolution was a unified and free United States of America.
The truth is always in the middle. The British government has the lovely excuse that the IRA are terrorists, murderers, and dangerous criminals. This allows them the luxury of utilizing the powerful tools of law enforcement -- machine guns, bulletproof vests, frivolous arrests, wire taps, and other borderline anti-human rights tactics -- to fight their side of the war. The IRA, which is an army organized to overthrow an oppressive government just like the Americans were, are using the scarce tools at their disposal to continue their efforts to fight what they consider an intolerable situation. The British are fine people, and the British government not so far off the mark on many issues. But the days of colonialism are over and just like Hong Kong was returned to the Chinese, Ireland must be returned to the Irish.
Michael O'Carroll <-- my grandmother's maiden name
UPDATE:
Much has changed since I first wrote this piece. The situation is now more complicated. I've had the pleasure of traveling around Ireland, both north and south, and I have a few new insights.
First off, the Good Friday agreement was a stroke of brilliance. The bottom line is, the north and the south share a very small island and it makes sense to me that they work together to govern themselves. The Brits have been very supportive of a self-governed Ireland. The problem now is that both sides are so god damned stubborn. They teach their frickin' kids how to hate each other. It's sad. The Protestants should quit whining and start working on the cooperative government. The IRA (and the dumb-ass Real IRA) should give up their god damn weapons. It is time to choose peace and your arms will no longer be needed. It is time to stop the vicious circle of revenge. Everyone has been hurt. No one feels better when they create additional hurt. Both of you grow the fuck up and figure out how to live together. You're all fucking Irish to the rest of us. The Republic of Ireland is a conservative place and it needs the influence of the more socially hip UK. Ireland is going to be a new thing now if you let it. You are not Orange and you are not Green, you are bloody Irish and the rest of us Irish who roam the wild world are sick or you arguing.
Ok.
Michael
If smoking was being introduced as a new product right now, it would not have a chance in hell of getting on the market. It is stupidly unhealthy and highly addictive. Smoking is around because of historical significance. Think about it -- cigarette lighters in cars are still standard. It was a given not so long ago that you could smoke on airplanes, in restaraunts, or at work. In movies everybody smoked. That people smoked was a given. In this day and age, with the rising cost of smoking-related health problems and general health-mindedness, smoking seems horribly out of date. Drugs that potentialy save people lives are kept off the market while something known to kill people is not only on the market, but advertised with billions of dollars.
But I'm not for making smoking illegal. I beleive people should be able to smoke any plant they want, or kill themselves any way they want. Smokers pay more for health insurance, so, in a way, they are buying the right to use expensive medical attention as the years of smoking slowly kill them. Prohibition of tobacco products would result in a huge public outcry and millions of new criminals. It would be unpopular, expensive to enforce, and just plain dumb.
But consistancy should be required. If our policy makers agree that lethal, addictive drugs should be legal, then all lethal, addictive drugs should be legal. Smoking is not the only drug with historical significance. Drugs like cocaine, marijuana, and herion have as colorful and varied past. Marijuana has had deep cultural impact on many generations. Positive impact. The prohibition of marijuana stands in stark and stupid constrast to the proliferation of much deadlier tobacco. I know some of you are thinking, yeah, maybe pot should be legal, but those other drugs shouldn't. Yes they should. The reason is simple and logical -- you can more effectively treat and control people with substance abuse habits in a non-criminalized environment. We are putting people in jail who need help, and jail turns them from escape-seeking hippies into hardened criminals. Cigarettes kill more people than all other drugs put together. "Hard drugs" are statisticaly less dangerous than cigarettes. This country (the good ol' u s of a) has been dangerously off the mark in drug policy for 30 or more years. There are many, many rational reasons to legalize all drugs, even if, and especially if, you want to see a reduction in drug use in this country:
I understand hacking. I see why it's attractive to people, especially young people, because it is powerful, challenging, fun, significant, and ego-boosting. There is a very real virtual world of internetworked computers and the normal rules don't apply. You can be a 14 year old kid and fuck up a huge corporation. As long as there are computers there will be unauthorized access and intrusion. That I understand. What I don't understand is a new breed of ignorant hacker that copies shit out of magazine and newsgroups for the sole intent of vandalism. There are simple hacks that can be done on common machines that will crash a great number of computers. There are brainless brute-force SYN attacks and the like. I don't understand how any of the above understandable hacker highs apply to the equivalent of smashing someone's windshield.
On the one hand, the only solution is for the security of all major network systems to try to stay one step ahead of hackers. Usually, though, they stay one step behind, which, for the most part, works fine. On the other hand, hackers should get/stay hip by being invisible. When you fuck peope's shit up, you gotta understand they're gonna use the tools they have available, like the FBI and shit. True hacking is being undetected and that means not damaging the systems you invade.
Chances are you'll die in your car. It is the number one cause of death among the non-elderly. Given this fact I think that we have really stupid policies regarding driving and traffic laws. Speeding is a perfect example. If we were really concerned about safe driving conditions on our highways we'd work toward getting everyone driving the same speed. We don't do that because we make speed limits artificially low and then let people go 5 to 20 miles per hour faster than that. Speed limits are too low and the fact that proves it is some 90% of people driving speed. Highways are dangerous places and are not for the faint of heart.
In driver's training they said 'driving is not a right, it's a privledge'. You know what else driving is? A skill. I sometimes stop and think that it is amazing that 4 cars, seperated only by lines painted on the street, can whiz by each other at 60 miles per hour only inches apart. When you screw up on the highway, people die. Yet we have no skill-based approach to driving criteria. They hand you your license at 16 and you can drive until you die. I'm not recommending that we further bearucratize ourselves with extra driving tests and such. What I would like to see is a total shift in priorites for our police in regards to our streets and highways. I've always felt a visible police presence on the highway does more to deter traffic violations than an invisible "speed trap" approach. I also think that we should encourage if not police other common sense conventions, like getting people up to speed on onramps and keeping slow people out of the fast lanes. I also think we should raise minimum and maximum speeds and then enforce those speeds. The speed limits should be based on the speed that people actually drive, not on an artificially low number that is not enforced. It is because speed limits are too low that the highway is so deadly. Roads are much safer when relative speeds are low, regardless of the actual speed. 10% of the people actually drive the speed limit, and the other 90% fly by them 5 to 15 miles per hour faster than that. I'd say the average speed on almost every road in this country is about 10 miles per hour faster than the posted speed limit. Let's raise minimum and maximum speed limits by 10 miles per hour on every road in this country.
Think about it.
MK
Hey you. You who is reading this. Sitting in front of that computer. You with the future. With the good job. With the start-up company. You with big dreams of becoming successful, wealthy, influential, respected. Will you become the enemy? Will you become like the ones that think that the bottom line really is more important than everything else? When the old conservative fucks that have all the bucks right now finally die off, will you embody the same single-minded intent of pure profit? Because, if so, I think we're in trouble. It is blatantly obvious that people like you (odds showing that most of you reading this are 20-40) are coming into power. This computer/information stuff is changing things fast and all of a sudden a few freaks with computers can become really rich, influential freaks. I like to use Wired Magazine as an example. This rag has ads from absolutely everybody influential in the computer industry and in business in general. Their ads are much less conservative than ads in other magazines. People dare to be different and/or weird in Wired. Wired has the word "fuck" in it a lot, nudity occasionally, casual references to drug use. It is big business meets slacker. Generation X, if that's what we call it, has arrived, has humongeous buying power, and is becoming the captains of industry. People die. A shift of power is constantly occurring. That power is coming to you.
What are you going to do with it?
We are civilized people. We believe that people can take care themselves. That they should take care of themselves. We believe in capitalism, which means if some people win, some people lose. We think that's fair. Yet, we generally have personal beliefs of a communist nature when it comes to our families and close friends. Generosity and helping hands from families and friends is one of the greatest support networks a person could have. It is based on common values that bad luck of one person can be eased by the good luck of another. That it is logical to assume that if there is plenty, none should go without. I can tell you some convincing reasons why you should be a liberal, but that's not what's important. What is important is that you realized that the time is now to start acting on principles you know are true. The fucking environment is a no-brainer. No matter who you are you should realize this is a vital, finite resource that need very careful management. The new world order bastards that are starting to die now do not give a fuck about the environment. When they hand you the keys you need to use good business sense and consider it a given to be non-destructive to the environment. I think that people like you believe in personal freedom issues, too. People should be free to be gay, married and gay, smoke cigarettes, smoke pot, gamble, pray or not pray, have abortions, etc. Old generations don't believe these things. We were born in the sixties. We know people who smoke pot. Successful people. We know people dead from AIDS. We grew up not really giving a shit if a person was black, white, asian or latino. Let's use our power to do good, honest business. Let's use it to do smart government. In a free market economy so much depends on the wills of industry. Communities, ecologies, and people need you to make good decisions. Your success has to support these things. I know you'll do the right thing.
I want a bigger check, too. But let's use our heads.
Sincerely,
Michael Koppelman
I don't think people understand what the job of the President of the United States is. He is a consensus builder. He is a leader in the Taoist sense in that he best does his job by staying out of the way. With the President we have the possibility of a single, educated, and well-meaning individual really making things better by translating American politics into a language people understand. He should be a team builder. He should supervise an equally qualified cabinet of other excellent people. (He should probably be a she. Someone please tell me why a woman has never run for President?) His agenda should not be partisan, but unified. He should not dictate policy, he should determine it. He should inspire a politics of intellect, not of partisan polarism. When bright people put their heads together they solve problems. Think about it...nothing wastes more time than office "politics". There is a nationalism of partisan politics that is based more on age-old instincts of clan, war, and fuedalism than anything intellectual. Political philosophy has become dogma. Mindless prayers to fake gods and ridiculous ritual.
Please wake up, people. Quit buying the bullshit they're selling. Elect intellectuals.
Michael Koppelman
Word of mouth is probably the single most ineffable, uncontrolablle, and important aspect of marketing. You can control to some extent what people see and hear of you, but not what they say of you. Spend a million dollars on advertising, but if the word on the street is you suck, you won't get their dime.
This segment of my web page has nothing to do with marketing -- I just thought I'd throw that in. This small strand of the World Wide Web is my recommendations to you on books, music, film, and other thing I like. You don't know me from Adam, but if you're smart you'll consume these things. In the interest of impact, I am only including the top few percent of these catagories. Most of these things changed my life or otherwise effected (affected?) me strongly.
Books
Mikhail Bulgakov: The Master and Margarita
| Of this more is written elsewhere on these pages, but for those just tuning in I'll reiterate what a fine piece of work this is. Doesn't matter who you are or what your tastes are, you'll like this book. |
Thicht Nyat Hanh: Old Path White Clouds
| This is a biography of the Buddha. It is not a "religious" book per se as its focus attempts to be more akin to historical fiction. Yet reading this book endows one the feeling of the spirit of Buddism. I am not one to mediate, yet reading this book was almost like meditating. It is a really long, thick book and I savored every page. I began to long for the peace I felt while reading this book. Sounds goofy, I know. This book is unlike the other books by Thicht Nyat Hanh I have read. Everything he writes reeks of peace. He is an amazing man who was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by Martin Luther King, Jr. I am amazed that this is not a more famous book. Needless to say at this point, read it. |
Robert Pirsig: Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintainence
| This IS a famous book, and for good reason. It is full of thinking, and thought, and ideas, and is raveled in an amazing story of truly unique man. People don't think enough in this world. This book gets you thinking. It's sequal Lila is also a worthy read. |
Anne Rice: The Vampire Chronicles
| More famousness. I personally love the dark side of things. Artistically, evil is much more interesting than good. No one realizes this more than Anne Rice. She has quite a following, but don't let that disuade you from reading this stuff. It is lusty and fast-moving with beautiful imagery and depth of character. |
JRR Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings
| The down side of JRR Tolkien is that he ruined the Fantasy genre. There is more shitty literature in this genre than any other because of the awesome scope and depth of this work. If swords and sorcery aren't your thing it could be because you've read or seen too much Fantasy crap and not the real thing. This is the real thing. The Lord of the Rings is the life's work of JRR Tolkien. He wrote a mythology from the ground up including tens of thousands of pages of writing with a half dozen languages, hundreds of songs and poems, creation myths, and a cast of characters spanning millenia. The Lord of the Rings is the golden tip of that iceberg. When you read a mention of a long dead hero, city, or event in this book, there are pages and pages of thought-out history behind it. When a character sings a few lines of an old song in an old language, it is a REAL language that JRR meticulously documented and developed. There are linguists to this day that study, speak, and write in many of JRR Tolkien's languages. This book, like some movies, needs to be read a couple of times at least to really get it. |
Lao Tsu: The Tao te Ching
| I'm sure there is an ugle reality to Taoism-in-practice that I am happily unaware of. The first line of this book is generally translated to something like "The Tao that can be spoken is not the true Tao". Oh, that the Bible and other so-called spiritual books were so open-minded. Spirituality can not really be read about, it can only be experienced. With this in mind, this book comes as close as possible to pointing us towards the Way. Taoism in this form is not diety worship. It's not religion. It's a book about living and thus, translated, the title is the Way of Life. |
Kurt Vonneguet: Cat's Cradle
| This is not so much a life changer as just a really good read. I've only dabbled in Vonneguet (Slaughterhouse Five) but he is good. But I probably don't have to tell you that as he is one of the more famous authors alive. If you want a good introdution, this is a quick and fun read. |
Tom Robbins: Jitterbug Perfume
| This is Tom Robbins's finest work. It is a tale that spans a thousand years of perfume, beets, and l o v e . . . You only have to read a few pages of this to get sucked in. Robbins has other great books like Stillife with Woodpecker and Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (which is a really shitty movie the the way, even with Uma in the cast) but this is his best. |
Marion Zimmer Bradley: The Mists of Avalon
| The tale of King Arthur has been told a lot of different ways but this one is by far the most unique. Bradley spins the yarn for the prespective of women and everything looks different. Morgaine (of Morgan le Fey) is the main narrator and protagonist of the book. Gwenevere is a stupid bitch for the most part. Every part of this well known story happens for different reasons that is commonly told. The result is a gripping and entertaining good time. This is a long book with much depth. |
Music
Kate Bush: The Hounds of Love
| This is a perfect record. Kate Bush at her best is the most truly creative musician I have ever heard. She defies form, function, and norms. Side two is a mini concept album called The Seventh Wave that obscurly tells the tale of a person drowning, dying, and passing to the beyond. It's a work of art. Not a work of attitude like most music today. This is music in its finest sense. |
Mozart: Symphony 41
| I grew familiar with this piece because I had to conduct it for conducting class when I was at Berklee College of Music. Unfortunately I was conducting a cassette player and not a symphony orchestra, but at least it was in tune. Anyway, this is a brilliantly simple piece that, in my mind, sums up the genius of Mozart. It fits together like math and yet is beautifully moving. It's a must listen if you are into classical music and a great introduction if you are not. |
Later,
LoLife
Let's talk about Microsoft. God knows this country is so enthralled with Microsoft, and for one reason only. Money. Microsoft is not hailed for it's innovation...in fact, have they ever invented anything? DOS is a rip-off, Windows is a Mac rip-off, Word is a bloated MacWrite....what exactly has this company done to earn our respect? Why does the business world bend over backwards to kiss their ass? That answer again: money. It's entirely because of the net worth of Bill Gates. Even Microsoft's market share, which is large in the OS market, does not warrant the current Microworship. Just because someone makes a prevelant OS doesn't mean they will be good at, for example, computer networks or, god-forbid, entertainment. The other large computer-related companies have never been so stupid as to think that just because they make a good buck on software that they can be successful in Hollywood. That is plain ludicrious. Microsoft can't even run a Web site, much less an entertainment company. Their much-heralded Internet Explorer is a good two years behind Netscape. If you throw in the fact that Microsoft's main dedication to open systems is Microsoft, you are left with a brand new picture of the future: the end of Microsoft.
Think of Bill Gates as something like the artist formerly known as Prince. He made one huge coup: in the former case DOS and the latter Purple Rain, and then tried to tell everyone on earth that that made him King. If Bill Gates was in the music industry he'd be Milli Vanilli. Because while Bill was out talking about his billions a new band came to town called Netscape, and thus far they have eaten Microsoft for breakfast. In a few months a company that didn't exist walked away with the Grammy that should have been Bill's. He had the money, he saw the Internet on the horizon, and yet he failed. Internet Explorer is now in the sticky position of having to say it is "Netscape compatible" and the Microsoft Network is dying fast and migrating to the Web. Ha ha ho ho hee hee....
But it's not just Netscape Mircrosoft has to worry about, either. There are other good bands playing in town, too. For example, Apple. How many times have we heard some so-called expert tell us about the death of Apple? Yet the Mac OS remains the most prevalent among artists of all types: Web designers, musicians, graphic designers. Even in the "Macs are toys" business world we are finding more and more people choosing the Mac OS, from ad agencies and management companies to Ben & Jerry's. The Mac OS is here to stay because.....drum roll please.....it's a real live easy to use fun truly plug and play OS. And while many Micromorons get a clue and buy a Mac, Mac owners never switch to PC's. People buy PC's because "that's what we have at work", but when they can buy what they want, they buy a Mac.
Suck my disk, Bill Gates. Take the money and run, you moron. Soon we will all dance on your grave.
Later,
LoLife
Dear Terry Gilliam-
I have a project for you. Now, you don't know me from Adam and I'm no big-wig in the movie industry, I'm just a normal, everyday person. But we need you, us normal people, to make a movie for us. A great movie. A fantastic and unbelievable movie. Like you did with Brazil. Wow, what a fucking great movie is Brazil?!? It is so thick with sarcasm, parody, and truth disguised as fun. It is fresh like no films these days are, it seems. Like, for example, what is this fasinaction with guns? Why do movie makers think guns are so damn exciting. And cops. And detectives. Have you ever met these people? Cops, for the most part, are jocks gone wrong...fat, stupid, and ignorant at the worst and plain boring at the best. How many twists and turns can we actually sustain with this dull motif? Brazil has ten times the action and dark terror of these brainless "action" films and does so with little overt violence. The Brazil "world" is constructed so completly that the fabric of the movie itself is the action. We are swept away in it.
That's what I need for this project I have for you. It is a book called "The Master and Margarita" and is by Mikhail Bulgakov and it would make the most awesome, fantastical movie ever. The gist of the plot is that the Devil and some pals go to Moscow to raise some trouble. The back of the book reads thus:
| Supressed in the Soviet Union for twenty-six years, Mikhail Bulgakov's masterpiece is an ironic parable on power and its corruption, on good and evil, and on human frailty and the strength of love. Featuring Satan, accompanied by a retinue that includes the large, fast-talking, vodka-drinking black tom cat Behemoth, the beautiful Margarita, her beloved -- a distraught writer known only as the Master -- Pontius Pilate, and Jesus Christ, "The Master and Margarita" combines fable, fantasy, political satire, and slapstick comedy into a wildly entertaining and unforgettable tale that is commonly considered one of the greatest novels ever to come out of the Soviet Union. |
Sound like pretty good stuff, no? Remember, this is the book that the Rolling Stones wrote "Sympathy For The Devil" about. So it's not like you have to be a large-craniumed scholar to read this book. In fact, the first chapter of this book, which would be the first 5 minutes of the flick, are sooooo captivating that you simply can't put the thing down.
Now one thing we have to be careful of is that damn law that says good books make shitty movies. Remember Dune? What were they thinking? Why would anyone deviate that far from a book that is that awesome? They just made up a bunch of weird shit that had little or nothing to do with the book. I personally doubt that what's-his-name...mr. twin peaks...even READ the damn book before he made that movie. See, we can't go there. We have to do it right and that means we have to follow the book verbatim.
Other pros to making this movie:
a) the dude that wrote it is dead, so me and you can split the $2,000,000 for the screenplay; b) it's about the Devil, so there'd be some good controversy from the Religous Right, Republicans, and maybe some Russians; c) a happy ending.
Some cons:
a) it will take at least a hundred millions dollars to make, and possibly years; b) my fees aren't cheap either; c) the film will be a good 3 hours long.
So, get the book, read it, and give me a call at (612)321-9290. My name is Michael. I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Michael Koppelman
PS - Someone send this to Terry Gilliam for me...
Hi.
When you live in Minnesota, this is the best time of year. Not because the weather is nice, because it really isn't, but because of the great amount of potential. From now until October we live in heaven. People of the North worship summer. The world considers us winter people but in reality we are the true summer people. Those that live in psuedo-summer all year long do not worship summer like we do.
It's spring at last, it's spring at last, thank god almighty, it's spring at last!
Carpe Diem
Good day,
I hate perfect music. As someone who is involved in the music business, I see people bleed the life out of music everyday. To me, it is imperfection that makes music whole and alive. That is why demo tapes often have a vibe that the finished record lacks: they usually have a spontanaity and carelessness that is beautiful. Perfect music ends up sounding like a Toto record or something. Music of the 60's has lasted because of that sloppiness, I think. If you listen to Hendrix, the Stones, or any of the other icons of the 60's, you find a passion that supercedes anal nit-picking.
And what applies to one thing often applies to other things as well. No matter what you do, overthinking tends to kill it. It is the middle path, of course. The Tao.
Oops...there I go getting philosophical again.
Peace, fellow humans...
