The zombies are attacking…

zombie.

Yesterday I watched “Stars on Ice” on TV, and today I read the article "Zombierna anfaller" ("The zombies are attacking") by the Swedish journalist Maria-Pia Boëthius, and I have also started to read the book “Stridens skönhet och sorg” (in English something in the style “The fight’s (or battle’s) beauty and sorrow”) by the Swedish historian Peter Englund, with portraits of ordinary people during the WWI built on real accounts and real people - and what I read, and am reading, made me think. You can read parts of the book here (in Swedish).

Boëthius writes (in my a little free amateur translation):

“That journalists are nasty at work doesn’t mean anything? Hey? Yes, they are only playing their roles. What!? The typical case is Alex Schulman, or we can call him ‘Alex Schulman’. Because he doesn’t exist in real life, he says himself. The bullying style is just a funny gimmick.”

Alex Schulman was invited to the Swedish radio apropos bloggers and that he had become unfairly flown on the throat by another Swedish journalist in a debate-program in Swedish TV because of his nasty style as blogger for one of our biggest evening papers.

Now it was revealed that it isn’t the real Schulman that is nasty in the blog, but his fictive self! He has taken the literary and, as one could understand, the heavy burden on his shoulders being the one flying on peoples’ throats.

Boëthius draws parallels to when she and her siblings were children and her brother had a brilliant creation, namely California, whom was identical twin with her brother, but a twin their parents didn’t know of. Sometimes her brother and California changed places, especially when he was up to some mischief. Then it was of course shown that her brother always was innocent.

Boëthius wonders where all those probably million fantasy-mates people had when they were children have disappeared. She wonders if not many of them have gotten jobs on Swedish newspapers (and on papers, and other media, in the world?).

My reflection, spontaneously, over what Boëthius wrote was:

“...not taking on the responsibility for (what you say or do or who you are)!"

And it also struck me that Alice Miller has written about cynicism and irony in one of or both her last two books.

I also reacted quite a lot at the jury members in “Stars on Ice” and what they said to the ones competing during the competition, their style of saying it and the content in what they said. I don’t think what they were saying and how they said it was fun at all. And not entertaining either. And not interesting. They were just nasty! Nasty for the competing people's own good? But they could probably handle it as they were grown ups. But the young people in "Idol"!?? See Bob Scharf on "Reality TV".

I have only read the first 30 pages (of over 600) in the book “The fight’s beauty and sorrow” and my interpretation so far is that people actually didn’t know why that war started. The conflicts underlying it weren’t so big so they hadn’t been insoluble and the war wasn’t unavoidable at all. But there was an excited rhetoric and a high-pitched worked up propaganda, and all this contributed to making the war unavoidable when it was viewed as unavoidable. Many people seemed to go out into the war with high expectations to fight for their country! And people at home said goodbye with flags and music! Many people didn’t seem to really realize how horrible a war actually is!

The American neurologist Jonathan Pincus writes about societal approval unleashing drives in people harmed early in life… See the earlier posting “Evilness and responsibility…” and earlier postings under the label Trent Scaggs.

Alice Miller writes at page 206 in her book “The Body Never Lies”:

“Inability to face up to the sufferings undergone in childhood can be observed both in the form of religious obedience and in cynicism, irony and other forms of self-alienation frequently masquerading as philosophy or literature.”

And at page 139 she writes:

“…feelings (one’s own and those of others), are something to be jeered at [hånad, gjord narr av]. In show business and journalism the art of irony is a well-paid commodity, so it is possible to make a great deal of money with the suppression of one’s feelings. Even if one ultimately risks losing contact with oneself and merely functioning as a mask, an ‘as if’ personality, there are always drugs, alcohol, and other substances to fall back on. Derision pays well, money is no object. /…/

But because these emotions are not genuine, not linked up with the true story of the body, the effect is bound to wear off [avta] after a time. Higher and higher doses are required to fill up the void left by childhood.”

So you need more and more and more until you can face up to the things underlying...

Macho ideals and the state of the world…

Jonathan Cook.

Gordon Gekko.

Patrick Bateman.

More voices in Sweden about the current states of affairs in the world:

One writer, Maria-Pia Boëthius, writes: An economical tribunal ought to become established. Not for imposing a penalty, but for making clear for the people around the world what has happened and who carry the guilt actually.

Such a tribunal should be sent directly over the web and in the public service channels all over the world. What we than got to know wouldn’t be dependent on the Medias’ reports and filtering of news because the Medias – the big – are also guilty to what has happened!

No of these bubbles would have been possible without the Medias’ eager cooperation and collaboration. But when the responsibility is to become claimed the medias always try to run away, only for to become the money-world’s obedient weapon in the next bubble.

The truth is that the media earn great money on that these bubbles are built, with the help of advertisement, PR and trademark building. The media and its owners have all interests in puffing the consumption up, because they seldom live on our direct buying but on the advertisements and the trademarkings’s (the making of trade marks) distorted message.

See about the British journalist Jonathan Cook here and here.

And read about ”The Intellectual Cleansing” part one and two here (Part one with the title “Keeping the Media Safe For Big Business”). Quotation from that site on what Media Lens is:

“Media Lens is our response to the unwillingness, or inability, of the mainstream media to tell the truth about the real causes and extent of many of the problems facing us, such as human rights abuses, poverty, pollution and climate change.”

The world needs an unbiased tribunal where even the Medias’ have to answer for their actions she thinks.

Another writer writes about our short sight needs and a sick system, something our politicians haven’t wanted to accept, and they haven't wanted to accept that they are responsible for a lot of what’s happening either. If we don’t see, hear… we have no responsibility? Yes, that about being in denial...

This writer writes about more and more advanced financial instruments in the financial world and thinks a financial system ought to see so the resources there are in the world are where they are needed. That all people ought to get their basic needs met. All financial institutions ought to account for what they do in this respect.

The earth has limited resources. All financial institutions ought to account for how they reduce the consumption of resources and leave space for other species to live.

All systems need time for reflection (thoughtfulness), even the financial systems. But the ones working in this system wants oscillations (?) because they earn money on differences. And are driven by mania??

But the instruments shouldn’t be there for the instruments' sake! Creativity ought to become encouraged too. Regular controls of the financial instruments so they don’t loose their transparency are needed.

A great part of this crisis is due to the fact that the politicians, put there to regulate these markets, in fact don’t understand those instruments.

We need to find a system where all people can live. We should need to steer the society in a transparent, fair and ecological direction.

A third writer (Martin Halldén in the Swedish magazine ETC) writes that it’s a sick man’s ideal behind the crisis! And I think that's really true! A CEO (VD in Swedish) for an investment company said a couple of years ago something in the style that:

“Buying house shares is like buying women. You don’t want to buy a cheap whore if you can buy an expensive whore.”

But this statement isn’t strange the writer thinks. Because in the financial world a sick man’s ideal rules he means. And has even contributed to the global financial crisis. Young men with Gordon Gekko and Patrick Bateman as models are competing about taking extreme risks and the climate in those circles favours lack of consideration - and has quite musty values.

Stockbrokers are mostly men working on workplaces dominated by men, and the financial market has become a reserve for young, aggressive men (yes, what are they playing out and what do their actions cause and have they caused?).

It is this sick macho culture that has created the decisions we now see the results of – when the stock markets now are falling all over the world.

Read Barbara Ehrenreich on Positive Thinking!!

The Swedish journalist Jan Guillou also wrote the other day about Blackwater and “Murder as Business Idea – Jan Guillou on the privatisation of the war – and Blackwater’s notorious mercenary soldiers.”

On a bike ride I came to think once again about what the American neurologist Jonathan Pincus writes about societal approval. And that's exactly what we see, societal approval and scapegoating. Here the politicians and media use scapegoats (unemployed, people on sick pay etc., claiming they are misusing the system) to put the blame on to steer the society in a direction they wouldn't have been able to steer it in otherwise (or not so quickly, without this it would have taken even more time than it has actually taken), and they have become accepted targets for people's needs to act all sorts of things out (probably childhood experiences in the bottom)!!! I react a lot towards this.