meximick's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- More ranting about the land I luv Went to a focus group tonight. I love that about this city - they want to know what people think about products and marketing and such, and they give me $75-$100 and some cookies to find out. The key to getting in is to find the right answers to the screening questions when they call. Get one response wrong and it�s, �Oh sorry, we were looking for a different audience for this group.� Sometimes they cue you in on the right answers, just to fill their quotas. I like that a lot. I didn�t like the product they were asking us about. I�m not supposed to say anything about it (I think?), but anyway, it�s a small key chain-sized device that receives constantly updated news, sports, weather, etc. anywhere you can receive FM reception. I told the guy, �If I was not near a newspaper, television, the internet, or a radio, I�d consider using it.� And I�m almost never not near at least one of those, sooo��. $75 richer. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Quotes I�m loving right now: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
I believe in America. I love it. It�s a beautiful place with an amazingly crazy, wondrous and fucked up history, filled with wonderfully incredible, diverse people, incredible feats of engineering, and some of the best corn dogs in the world. Do we have it better here than the people of countless other nations? Without a doubt. Does that mean that since we have it so much better, SO FUCKING MUCH better, that we�d best not complain? Fuck no. We should strive constantly toward a more unified, more perfect society. We should embrace the differences among our people and work together in order to make this planet, and all of our lives better. I know it�s possible. I fucking know it. But then how would Northrup Grumman and Lockheed Martin make their money? Cynicalmuch? I know. But I still love her and I believe in her near limitless possibilities. I hate that the power of government is controlled by the wealthy few. Another thing I hate is the fact that we as a nation are more deeply concerned with �American [fucking] Idol� than with the rollback of important environmental policies by the Bush Administration. We are better at entertaining ourselves with television, movies, sports, celebrity gossip, shopping, Internetlife, stock portfolios, drugs and alcohol use, anything other than reading up on, and becoming familiar with the current state of the world. From all TV news programs, we get easily digested packages of sound bites and sameness packed into convenient 30-minute servings. Why? Because that is all that most Americans care for. Don�t make it too complex, or we�ll see what else is on. We want things fast and easy and cheap and now. We�re so fucking spoiled, it�s ridiculous. People in Europe currently pay $5+ for a gallon of gasoline. It went up, what, $1.00 in the US a couple years ago and people flipped out. If we were forced to pay $5.00 per gallon here, there would be rioting in the streets by car-owners. And bicycle riders would laugh and cheer. Because Americans have been among the most spoiled people on the planet, we pass on the laziness of our convenient lives, and bland ideas for �a brighter America� to subsequent generations without even caring or doing anything to change how the next generation will view the world, and America�s place in it. This world is too complex to be understood by sound bites and USA Today. But many Americans lack the time and effort to even try.
We are a very short-read nation, I feel. Literacy programs and National Reading Weeks aside, we just do not read enough about world history, current events, and local, state and national politics. It is not emphasized strongly enough in our schools and in our daily lives. (Christ, now there�s �Cable in the Classroom� � we need kids to watch MORE TV, again, de-emphasizing our need to read anything substantive.) We leave that sacred book knowledge to a select few - doctors, lawyers, academics, etc.- and trust these educated leaders will tell us what�s best for our nation, whatever the hell that means. Meanwhile, our leaders and their staffers understand this perfectly and are adopting shortsighted foreign and domestic governmental policies with oversimplified explanations. Policy decisions are made not through open debate or public referendum, but via focus groups from Middle America. This is a trap that America has fallen into, baited with our own lazy desires. We are the dumb, smiling, ruthless, rich, attractive, popular kid in the Global High School who steals lunch money from weaker kids while lecturing about �freedom�, but is secretly nursing a raging coke habit. And many people are satisfied with that. Or don�t realize. Or don�t fucking care. Another of our main problems is the heavy emphasis on individualism. Reckless individualistic hedonism is cherished above most other freedoms in America. It�s so much easier to become absorbed with our own pleasures than to care about the lives of others. Instead of confronting the scary truths of the world in order to solve them, we bury our heads in the sand and hope that we stop hearing about what a depressing place this world is. And we put a flag we cut out of the newspaper in our window to show how patriotic we are. We need to grow the fuck up. I�m not saying I�m trading in my Playstation, but at least I�m concerned. And trying to learn more, and to talk with others about the things no one seems to talk about. 5:44 p.m. - 2003-02-06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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