Wednesday, January 03, 2007
!drawkcaB
The first of the negative utopias was a rather tame book written by Samuel Butler in 1871, called 'Erewhon'. ('Nowhere' spelled backwards.) The main premise was that in the land of Erewhon, morality and criminality were inverted. [Incidentally, Erewhon's copyright long since lapsed, and it's available in full form online.]
I think Butler would especially appreciate our public treatment of Saddam's hanging. In the forward world, the job of a news report is to show you what happened. In our drawkcab world, the job of a news report is to show you other people witnessing and discussing a news report of the event, which you won't get to see.
The first major example of drawkcab swen was the idiotic Robert Novak vs Joe Wilson affair, in which the 'news' reporters knew exactly what had occurred but told us a tangled story about the attempt to figure out what had occurred, which was supposedly a mystery.
In a forward nation at war (like the US in 1943) we saw and rejoiced at every detail of an enemy leader's death. In the drawkcab swen of 2007, we see Iraqis watching their cell phones and rejoicing at the death of our enemy, but we don't get to see the enemy's death. In a forward nation at war, anyone who failed to taunt an evil man would be at least suspect; we'd assume he was on the side of the evil man. In the drawkcab "legal system" of 2007, the people who taunted Saddam are arrested.
We cannot win a war this way. We cannot even function this way. ¶ 10:43 AM
I think Butler would especially appreciate our public treatment of Saddam's hanging. In the forward world, the job of a news report is to show you what happened. In our drawkcab world, the job of a news report is to show you other people witnessing and discussing a news report of the event, which you won't get to see.
The first major example of drawkcab swen was the idiotic Robert Novak vs Joe Wilson affair, in which the 'news' reporters knew exactly what had occurred but told us a tangled story about the attempt to figure out what had occurred, which was supposedly a mystery.
In a forward nation at war (like the US in 1943) we saw and rejoiced at every detail of an enemy leader's death. In the drawkcab swen of 2007, we see Iraqis watching their cell phones and rejoicing at the death of our enemy, but we don't get to see the enemy's death. In a forward nation at war, anyone who failed to taunt an evil man would be at least suspect; we'd assume he was on the side of the evil man. In the drawkcab "legal system" of 2007, the people who taunted Saddam are arrested.
We cannot win a war this way. We cannot even function this way. ¶ 10:43 AM
