Monday, February 8, 2010

Super Bowl review.

"A culture that cannot distinguish between reality and illusion dies. And we are dying now. We will either wake from our state of induced childishness, one where trivia and gossip pass for news and information, one where our goal is not justice but an elusive and unattainable happiness, to confront the stark limitations before us, or we will continue our headlong retreat into fantasy."

The above is from Christopher Hedges' critique of modern America, "The Empire of Illusion." I thought of it as I watched as much of the "game" as I could stand last night.

Drugged, over-sized black men, led by a white man to "redeem a city."
The bombast and noise of the legion of announcers. (Imagine if our wars were as well-covered.) Products as drugs--particularly beer, soda and soap.

Someone who builds his house out of Bud Light? People who prefer to live on a desert island with Bud Light to being saved? Coke promising you can "open happiness"? Soap, or pants, that let you assert your man-ness?

This is bread and circuses and I found it all very depressing.

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