Courtesy of The Automatic Earth.
NPC Confiscated still, Washington, DC 1922
I’m sorry, or I guess I am, but I find it hard not to constantly read up on the news about flight MH17 these days, and I let it drown out other things. Obviously, there’s plenty of it available in Dutch media, with much more to drown even that out in the English language press.
For a country the size of Holland, losing 193 people in one go evokes the six degrees of separation. And that makes sense, grief must be shared in order to heal. I just – or think that I should – wish I had more confidence in today’s people’s abilities to make that experience real, instead of to a large extent mass media induced.
And besides, closely connected, who would want to talk about yen and interest rates when lighting strikes so close to home? Which reminds me of why I talk about those things all the time: to try and make as many people as I possible can think about the difference between what they’re being told, and what is actually happening to them and to the world around them.
The aftermath of the plane crash reveals once more, as if there was a need, what an uphill struggle that is. The pre-fab picture of what is supposed to be perceived as ‘them’ and as ‘evil’ goes down hook line and sinker, without hardly anyone asking for a shred of proof; it doesn’t seem to matter one bit.
The enemy is given a face, and a carefully crafted storyline, and we’re off to the horses. You could be excused for being inclined to wonder why they bother to teach people how to read. Perhaps the idea is that it makes the story go down faster.
Accusations, allegations, insinuations, suspicions, we’re being treated to a boxful of chocolates and some of us know exactly what we’re going to get, but then they’re not our treats, they’re for the others, the ones with the sugar addiction.
The best thing I can hope for, and perhaps all of us can, is that a few people will see in a sliver of light shining through the present parade of fighting innuendo, what it is they’re being told, and have been told for many years now, about their economies, their savings, their pensions, and the future of their children.
That those stories have as much truth and proof in them as the ones about who started the battles in Iraq, and Kiev, and East Ukraine. That this is an MO: to tell people what you want them to believe, clad in carefully crafted spin, so they’ll support whatever power games your twisted minds are playing, power over a county, a country, a planet.
That’s really the best to hope for: a few more people who hear the metal click of the coin drop, whether it’s about plane crashes or economic crashes; a few more who would like to see at least a shred of proof before their minds are made up for them.
