Survival

Perhaps it can be said that nobody is really ever resigned. Everybody fights regardless of the situation or predicament. It's just how it's done, and how the rest of us judge it.

Give a real life loser access to the internet, and he can create a king in cyberspace. That's survival. When we deterioriate in reality, our virtual lives flourish. Identity is still identity regardless of the dimension.

Only that some dimensions are more 'real' than others. 'Better' than others. More 'respectable' than others.

Create more artificial and synthetic channels, worlds and realities as we progress technologically, and prepare to see a decline in the effort to uphold a respectable real life identity. Give people more places to hide away legitimately from our primary reality, and soon there'll be more soulless bodies than we might be comfortable with.

Even the heavily depressed are seeking survival by leaving this world.

We Will Always Be A Light

Live in the moment, because the way I see it, there is no better way.



The universe, or whatever limits we wish to impose on the metaphysical world around us, is a storm of infinite possibilities and the beauty of our existence is that we ourselves bring form to an otherwise incoherent mass simply by impinging on it through our very being of finitude and flaws.

Pick up a sport, do a dance, join an event, make a difference. Love somebody and expect nothing back. Live in the moment and embrace it for all its worth so that there is no room for regret. Etch a memory that you'd otherwise regret not having.



Oceans won't freeze
So loosen your heart
Underestimated
Undefeated
In this love



I like to think back about those times spent watching the thousands of faceless people walk by - essentially the same anonymous crowd but only in different places - and materialise faces for them by pondering about the lives of others, of the lenses with which others see reality through, and the histories they have had to enjoy and endure all the same to shape and colour them.



“It is the mind which creates the world around us, and even though we stand side by side in the same meadow, my eyes will never see what is beheld by yours, my heart will never stir to the emotions with which yours is touched.”
- George Gissing

Perhaps there's an innate calling for humans to want to bridge that gap with those that matter so that lives can intertwine into an explosion of chemistry, so that it can come as close as possible to living in the same personal sphere.




Audio Candy:
Stars - Ageless Beauty

The Distinction Between Reality And TV

Because I live in a cave now that I don't have a computer at home, I'm forced to seek other sources of entertainment. Newspapers serve to fill time, but they don't quite satisfy the entertainment aspect of things, so I started expending DVDs that I haven't watched yet. Dreamgirls is a pretty good movie. But after 2 days my DVD supply ran out, so last night I ended up watching some Channel 8 drama rerun, titled The Vagrant, which was irritatingly inane, and then I watched America's Next Top Model (some previous cycle), which did serve to entertain within really shallow means, of which I'd admit I lapped up but I'm not proud to do so.

Angie just pointed out what I couldn't put a finger to, so I'll add that it's quite perverse. Kinda like one of those things you despise doing, but you end up enjoying anyway and then hate yourself for liking the thing you despised. But whatever.

I found Sarah VonderHaar quite attractive in a Posh Spice kinda way.

It was interesting; the contestants were given their first photoshoot and they had to portray a political statement, such as anti-fur, pro-choice, vegan, anti-death penalty, pro-gun, etc, whether they agreed with it or not. And the results were quite fascinating; apparently how inspired you are to assert a statement depends a lot on your own ideologies and, to the trained eye, it is very clear when captured in a still frame. Nigel Barker, the photographer, put it quite well: "In a movie you have 100s of lines to bring your message across. In a photograph you have just that one moment." Never knew so much could go into a picture.


When did reality
Become TV?
Whatever happened to
Gameshows, sitcoms
Or the radio or
Springsteen, Madonna
Way before Nirvana?


I'm quite ambivalent about an age defined by reality TV. Along the lines of this age of reality TV, we have the advent of blogs and personality sites as well, amongst other things. Personally, I think that celebrities shouldn't be born out of the reality TV, American-Idol-esque production concept because we get to see them in such a flawed light. This in turn really blurs the traditional distinction between mundane reality and plastic superstardom. It's kinda like how you shouldn't know the past of someone you respect, like a teacher or a pastor. Once you're privy to that knowledge, the ones you look up to, admire and/or respect can become far too ordinary.

I guess I kinda had something like that going when I was in the army. After seeing the depths of loserism some people can succumb to, it does make one wonder what kinda people some of the conventionally-revered persons in society have been before they got there. Especially officers, since they're the ones who often have the resource to become important people in future.

You get to see the worst in potential celebrities as they slug it out backstage on reality TV or when judges spew out all their faults as if they were little kids. Increasingly, celebrities are appearing on personality profile sites like Facebook and Myspace, bringing them far down to earth that they're practically touchable. And on the other hand, normal people are garnering increasing celebrity status through media such as blogs. People also get recognition through talkshows that increasingly wish to propel stories of ordinary people into the public media sphere, such as Oprah, Ellen DeGeneres and Jerry Springer.

I don't really know what's worse. That superstars now are becoming too ordinary, or that the plastic nature of superstardom is invading our normal lives. But if you're talking about the sanctity of being grounded in reality, then the pervasiveness of the celebrity status into the realm of the ordinary does sound like the greater evil, along with it's creeping voyeurism of the public overriding the private.




Discretion is being able to raise your eyebrow instead of your voice.

Audio Candy:
Bowling For Soup - 1985