Good / Grief

Last night's episode of Channel 4's 'Astronauts: Living in Space' reminded me of two of my earlier posts, One Earth - Why are we Squabbling over it? and A Look at Conflict: How Long can you hold a Grudge?

Our world is a complete miracle, but one of contrasts - Hot. Cold. High. Low. Dry. Wet. Beautiful. Dangerous.  And, at the building block level, Positive and Negative - the analogies we also use to describe our outlook.

I naturally incline towards the positive - I don't like to think that it's a freaky coincidence that the moon, although much smaller and closer, happens to fit exactly the size of our giant sun during an eclipse.  Or that it influences the Earth's tides so that our oceans and rivers cleanse themselves.  I marvel at the sheer distances in the Universe ... it blows my mind that we talk in terms of millions of light years, when I can barely get my head around the sun's rays taking only 8 minutes to cover the nearly 100 million miles to get to us.

Pondering stuff like this transcends the suffocating humdrum of daily life and puts a toe in the waters of spirituality - something beyond ourselves.  Call it what you will - Consciousness. Faith. Awareness. One-ness.  But I'd rather believe that there's a purpose to our existence than accept it as a happy accident.  And, for me, that's worth preserving.

So give me Love & Peace over Hate & War any day.  Easy and sensible choice, right?  Yet why is the world in political turmoil?  Surely everyone would prefer to live in Utopian harmony?

This is where the intangibles kick in - like emotion and sentiment.  Because it's not about who's Right or Wrong - principles are only as valuable as the best orator.  It's about whether the intent is Good or Evil.

If you believe nothing else, know that these forces are real and as viable as anything physical.  History points to the evidence.  We're not just organisms - we have the capacity to grasp this concept of positive and negative and, in my view, are an integral part of the cosmic machinations of working it through.  Science confirms that there's a constant dance going on between the two - for every action, a reaction.  A state of flux.  But if one were ever to prevail over the other, there would be a fundamental shift in the order of things.  Maybe then the Unknown will manifest itself ...

You better get on your knees and pray that the victor is Good, folks - it's gonna be a trippy ride.  In the meantime, play nice and delight in our beautiful planet.

Big Brother - beyond Orwell's worst nightmares

Original post: 18 June 2013
 
I usually like my posts to have a bit of a shelf life, but my 'Rage-o-Meter' hit red last night when C5's 'Big Brother' programme issued a contestant with a formal warning for 'inappropriate language' (I think they stopped just short of suggesting she was racist) because she stated a personal preference not to date black men.

So, if I wouldn't go out with someone over 70 - would that make me ageist?  Or, being straight, date a gay man (if I wasn't already married) - I'd be branded a homophobe?  Or someone who didn't have blue eyes and blonde hair? - Good Grief, they'd have me down as a Nazi!

The effect of such misinterpretation of the spirit of the law is that, rather than promote social harmony, it actually drives a wedge further through it.

Channel 5 should retract.

Update: CBB 24 August 2013

... and they've done it again.  Warned a contestant for saying the 'N' word in proper context while recounting a story widely reported in the press - not directed at anyone or used in a malicious way.  It was bleeped out (rightly so), but then spoken and aired by the producers themselves when issuing a formal warning.  I'm sure higher powers are doing this deliberately to gauge how well the public interpret what constitutes offence and to stimulate debate ... either that or C5's legal advisers are incompetent (IMHO) or, at best, hypocritical.


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