Massive Attack
Was on Massive Attack’s concert today. And was massively attacked. Great concert not only because of their music (i like very much from their beginnings) and visual effects but because their concert had a message. Clear message. As there were a lot of meaningful words rolling on a big screen behind about war, all articles for impeachment of J.W. Bush, prisoners without a trial, quotes about freedom and democracy (No man is above the law and no man below it) the whole message can be summed up: “Fear is not a natural state of civilized people.”(Aung San Suv Kyi)” People have to be aware what is going on, have to think, have to be critical toward democracy preachers otherwise other will think instead of them. Fear paralyses, fear change brain’s gray matter, puts you into inferior position,…
Not talking about normal human response on adrenalin rush; i am talking about damaging effect of constant, invisible, omnipotently present fear without a real bases, which we are hearing about through media every day. Either terrorism or global warming or damaging diseases or god… They might attack you at the moment you expect the least, so be rather afraid. Very afraid. Constant fear makes you run instead of fight. (see 2. The Power of Nightmares, subtitled The Rise of the Politics of Fear of Adam Curtis)
There is a lot of them who are more than willing to comfort you but for some return. Like exchange of true freedom for fake freedom. Like putting your worries into their hands to take care of them. As quote from Massive Attack’s big screen says: “Freedom is never free.”
Like this guys who have the power to rise the awareness among masses accompanied with great music. It’s a food for emotions and mind.
Watched lately documentary Secret rulers of the world and if the half of what they’re saying is true, than this world is scary place for a living. But if people don’t know they take everything as granted.
Reminded me on very good Paul Auster ‘s book In The Century of last Thing. A world, narrowed to pure survival, trapped into corrupted system which imprisoned people. It’s a good portrait of devastation of either outher or inner person’s world. Once you are within the system, the possibility to escape is limited almost to zero. The only thought to keep you alive is that there , outside this system is another world, better one, the one you still keep in your memories. Or the one your desperate hope has built.
In In the Country of Last Things Paul Auster offers a haunting picture of a devastated world – futuristic world – but one which chillingly shadows our own. – Faber and Faber.
And the movie with the same title is in postproduction phase now.
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one of my fav of MA
MASSIVE ATTACK: MEZZANINE
“Mezzanine”
[3d]
I’m a little curious of you in crowded scenes
And how serene your friends and fiends
We flew and strolled as two eliminated gently
Why don’t you close your eyes and reinvent me
[Daddy G]
You know you’ve got that heart made of stone
You should have let me know
You could have let me know
[3d]
We’ll go ’till morning comes
And traffic grows
And windows hum
[Daddy G]
Speding all week with your friends
Give me evenings and weekends
Evenings and weekends
[3d]
I could be yours
We can unwind
All these have flaws
All these have flaws
You’d agree it’s a typical high
You fly as you watch your name go by
And once the name goes by
Not thicker than water nor thicker than mud
And the eight k thuds it does
Sunset so thickly
Let’s make it quiet and quickly
Don’t frown
It taste’s better on the way back down
I could be yours
We can unwind
All these have flaws
All these have flaws
All these have flaws
Will lead to mine
All these have flaws
All these have flaws
Will lead to mine
Will see to
All these have flaws
All these have flaws
Will see to
All these have flaws
Will lead to mine
We can unwind all our flaws
We can unwind all our flaws
Game theory: Freedom and/or rationality
Watched excellent BBC documentary The Trap:What happened to our dream of freedom of Adam Curtis (author of Happiness machines i was writing about last time). There are three parts and in first part he questions what is freedom all about, what is normality and how mathematical models modeled people and society. Is it true that we are selfish, isolated and suspicious human creatures, constantly monitor and strategies each other, to maximize our own benefit? Measurable predictable androids? For every measurement we need to set a reference. Who is the one who set the reference upon which people should be measured? Is it orchestrated from behind or maybe history by accident takes its mysterious way. Or maybe is mix of both. Did nature equip us with beautiful mirror neurons to understand others in order make the best strategy for maximizing our own result and not for empathy as a base for real humanity !?
Curtis starts with Game theory of John Nash (Beautiful Mind) and how his theory was implemented as a tool in predicting Soviet reaction during the cold war (Nash’s paranoia resonated just well with paranoia of Cold War). And as every idea it found mysterious ways of implementation, far beyond cold war tool. Even faking results to prove its correctness in various situations by those who used it to justify either believes or actions (psychiatry, Vietnam’s war,…)
He continues with psychiatry which defines normality from Freud on. Dark age of psychiatry, colored by electroshocks, followed by anti psychiatric movement (Laing),use of game theory in family dynamics (love is just a strategy to maximize own benefit or dominance over partner). Shame of psychiatric diagnoses due to Rosenhan_experiment ( 8 healthy people were set to mental hospitals. During psychiatric assessment they claimed to be hearing voices that were often unclear, but noticeably said the words “empty,” “hollow” and “thud.” No other psychiatric symptoms were claimed, and apart from giving false names and employment details, further biographical details were truthfully reported. If admitted, the pseudo-patients were asked to “act normally,” report that they felt fine and no longer heard behaved completely normally. 7 of them were diagnosed with schizophrenia, 1 with bipolar disorder. They were all given powerful drugs. They haven’t been allowed to leave the hospital. This was disaster for psychiatric society what lead to rational and quantified questioners to avoid subjective judgment. They set up a list of measurable characteristic (symptoms) on which people answered yes or no, either they have those characteristic or not. Questionnaires have been distributed to ordinary people. Evaluating the results they found that 50% of people have some types of mental disorders. Normal sadness for example became depression.
Psychiatrist started with screening process due to latent mental illness. They’ve spread a check list among people, so people used new definitions of disorders to compare their behaviour with “normal behaviour”. No elite needed to monitor people anymore, people started to monitor themselves by list of “normality”. And if not “normal”, pharmaceutical companies were more than willing to offer them magical Prozac. To be “normal” and constantly happy. And easier manageable.
Its amazing what kind of results some big ideas of liberalization produced (Sartre, Fanon– liberalisation of itself through violence; Che Guara, Arafat…, suport of dictators to liberalize communistic countries, trainings of contra-revolutionaries, fake evidences, …)
So who we are behind what they told us scientists, politicians, religions, behind all this overwhelming social construction?…How is to feel normally behind “normally as they told and suggested us … Is freedom to heavy burden for current level of human existence or is freedom just part of broader cycle and context and not the universal state itself?
1st part of documentary: F* you buddy
2nd part: “The Lonely Robot”
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1087742888040457650&q=the+trap+2&ei=0IorSPDKLo-ciALWpbTjCQ
3rd part: We Will Force U 2 to Be Free
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7581348588228662817&q=the+trap+3&ei=7YwrSPShKojgiQKnk5niCQ
and Kraftwerk video: The Robots
We’re charging our battery
And now we’re full of energy
We are the robots
We’re functioning automatik
And we are dancing mechanik
We are the robots
Ja tvoi sluga (=I’m your slave)
Ja tvoi Rabotnik robotnik (=I’m your worker)
We are programmed just to do
anything you want us to
we are the robots
We’re functioning automatic
and we are dancing mechanic
we are the robots
Ja tvoi sluga (=I’m your slave)
Ja tvoi Rabotnik robotnik (=I’m your worker)
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