Things Are Bad

  "I don't have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It's a depression. Everybody's out of work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys a nickel's worth; banks are going bust; shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter; punks are running wild in the street, and there's nobody anywhere who seems to know what to do, and there's no end to it."

This was the speech that went through my mind just before I sat down to write today's episode of how bad things are. If you don't recognize them, it is the preamble of TV newsman Howard Beale. Fictional TV newsman Howard Beale, from the film Network. If you've never seen it, or perhaps you've seen it and have forgotten it, I can tell you that it was prescient. If you're not sure what "prescient" means, I'll give you a few minutes to do your research, but promise to come back here. 

I'll wait. Things probably won't be much worse by the time you come back. 

Okay. 

So if that movie was made back in 1976. Almost fifty years ago. It accurately predicted the coming of infotainment, reality TV and a world that seemed happy to do whatever their television told them to do. If anything, it might have come up a little short, not having the TV personality become President of the United States. 

Howard continued, way back when: "It's like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don't go out any more. We sit in the house, and slowly the world we're living in is getting smaller, and all we say is, 'Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel-belted radials, and I won't say anything. Just leave us alone.' Well, I'm not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad!"

Fifty years later, are you mad? There is a saying, often attributed to Tom Morello, guitarist for Rage Against The Machine, that goes, "If you're not angry, you're not paying attention." Tom quite likely is not  the original source of this sentiment, and it may predate the ravings of Howard Beale. But I agree with Howard and Tom. Now is not the time to sit quietly in your living rooms. It's time to get up and go to your window, open it up and stick your head out. 

And yell. 

If you're not sure what to yell, I'll give you another couple of minutes to review. 

Let me know if you heard anyone else yelling.