Jan 27
Pseudo-intellectual nonsense
So, TLC is possibly the most intellectually bankrupt network on tv. They have not one but TWO shows about dudes with multiple wives. There’s 19 Kids and Counting, a show about the Dugger family, Michelle & Jim-Bob, raising 19 kids. Aside from being boring to watch, the Duggers regularly use their “fame” to spearhead anti-gay and lesbian campaigns, including a state-wide robo-call against marriage equality in Arkansas. They have a late-night talk show, All About Sex, during which the hostesses seem to go on and on about how they mostly try to avoid sex with their spouses/lovers. Well, except Margaret Cho, she’s down for anything. All these shows have pseudo-intellectual catch phrases, “We just love each other,” “Love should be multiplied, not divided,” “…somehow, we just make things work,” “Dirty, filthy, fucking.” Okay, maybe that last one isn’t so intellectual, pseudo or otherwise, but the others are just things stupid people say to sound smart or profound, or to make their lives sound provocative. These are all pretty spectacular, in an awful sort of way. Dirty, filthy, fucking just might go on my epitaph. However, we might have a new top of the heap from one of TLC’s new reality train-wreck, My Big Fat Beautiful Life, it’s a show about this lady who’s overweight because of a medical condition. but loving life just the same. Now, anybody who puts their life on tv, or on a blog… is open to criticism, medical condition or no. Myself included. THAT SAID… This lady’s, sort of, life motto, just strikes me as totally vacuous, “I only have this one life to live, and it damn sure better count.”
I only have this one life to live, and it damn sure better count, it’s so… motivational speaker-esque. It’s just a bunch of words that add up to nothing. Yes, we only get one shot at life, so far as we know, that’s true enough. It’s the second half of her motivational gold that bothers me. See, every life counts, for good or ill, every life counts, no damn sure betters about it. We leave footprints in the world, it happens without even trying. Whether you’re Steve Jobs, or someone’s crazy cat-lady aunt, you’re remembered, you affect the people around you. Our worry should be that at the end of our everything, we left the world a little brighter than when we entered it, not whether or not we made life “count.”
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6 Comments so far
Great text. I like the end of it, particularly. A little brighter… Sometimes I doubt if I’m really going to left the world a little brighter than before. Maybe yes or maybe not… but I’ll try.
100% yes!
Dude, you should have your own TV show : -)
Totally enjoyed reading this!! You are definitely right….we should leave the world a little brighter…. 🙂
Michael, I enjoyed reading this post (& was happy to receive a longer one) but I have to disagree with you. Also, I think your post is contradicted by the one that precedes it: “2015 has to be something good. I have to endeavor to make it something good… I kind of just let 2014 happen to me, I can’t let 2015 go the same way.” It appears to me you were saying you’d like to accomplish more this year than you did last year. In other words, you want to make 2015 “count” (or count more, at least).
Our days are full of chances to make our world a little brighter, so it’s important that we LOOK for those opportunities and take advantage of them. Each day, we can think about what can be done to help other people overcome their problems, or just worry about our own problems. We can spend our free time reaching out to do favors for friends & volunteer work for strangers, or sit alone and play video games for hours on end. We can do things to show the people we live or work with that we love them & appreciate all they do for us, or we can treat them with indifference.
And regardless of what we did, or failed to do last year, last month, or yesterday, today we have another chance to choose to make better use of our time, to use the talents God gave us, and to struggle to achieve our potential.
Carpe diem. Have a great week, Michael — love you, man.
Ed: I think you’re misunderstanding… I’m not TRYING to make anything “count,” counting just happens. If we’re taking stalk yearly, 2014 counted badly. 2015 might count better. I didn’t contradict myself at all, my entire point was EVERYTHING we do counts, a day or a month or a year or a life can’t NOT count.