The Jelly Roll
posted by The Declinist at 1:44 PM
1 comments
Monday, December 27, 2004
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
A Time to Weep
Every now and again a new testament to decline emerges from one of our great writers that needs to be cited in full. This is such an occasion. This gem would not have come to my attention but for the sheer generosity of the good people over at Gothamimage, who are diligently working day and night to rescue great works from falling in the black hole of google cache. It is the commencement address given by Ted Sorenson at the New School University in New York on May 21, 2004. Ted Sorenson, a former aide to President John F. Kennedy, laments what has now prophetically become the year of the monkey. Written shortly after the revelations at Abu Gharib, he marks our time as the beginning of the “decline and fall” of America, not so much in the specificity of our actions, which will fade, but in the threadbare moral fabric of a nation.
In honor of the retirement of the founder of C-Span, Brian Lamb, and the subsequent end of Booknotes (yet another sign of decline), I will here post the full text of Sorenson’s speech and then open the floor to your comments.
A Time to Weep
by Ted Sorenson
This is not a speech. Two weeks ago I set aside the speech I prepared. This is a cry from the heart, a lamentation for the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness.
Future historians studying the decline and fall of America will mark this as the time the tide began to turn - toward a mean-spirited mediocrity in place of a noble beacon.
For me the final blow was American guards laughing over the naked, helpless bodies of abused prisoners in Iraq. "There is a time to laugh," the Bible tells us, "and a time to weep." Today I weep for the country I love, the country I proudly served, the country to which my four grandparents sailed over a century ago with hopes for a new land of peace and freedom. I cannot remain silent when that country is in the deepest trouble of my lifetime.
I am not talking only about the prison abuse scandal, that stench will someday subside. Nor am I referring only to the Iraq war - that too will pass - nor to any one political leader or party. This is no time for politics as usual, in which no one responsible admits responsibility, no one genuinely apologizes, no one resigns and everyone else is blamed.
The damage done to this country by its own misconduct in the last few months and years, to its very heart and soul, is far greater and longer lasting than any damage that any terrorist could possibly inflict upon us.
The stain on our credibility, our reputation for decency and integrity, will not quickly wash away.
Last week, a family friend of an accused American guard in Iraq recited the atrocities inflicted by our enemies on Americans, and asked: "Must we be held to a different standard?" My answer is YES. Not only because others expect it. WE must hold ourselves to a different standard. Not only because God demands it, but because it serves our security.
Our greatest strength has long been not merely our military might but our moral authority. Our surest protection against assault from abroad has been not all our guards, gates and guns or even our two oceans, but our essential goodness as a people. Our richest asset has been not our material wealth but our values.
We were world leaders once - helping found the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, NATO, and programs like Food for Peace, international human rights and international environmental standards. The world admired not only the bravery of our Marine Corps but also the idealism of our Peace Corps.
Our word was as good as our gold. At the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis, former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, President Kennedy's special envoy to brief French President de Gaulle, offered to document our case by having the actual pictures of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba brought in. "No," shrugged the usually difficult de Gaulle: "The word of the President of the United States is good enough for me."
Eight months later, President Kennedy could say at American University: "The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate ... we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just."
Our founding fathers believed this country could be a beacon of light to the world, a model of democratic and humanitarian progress. We were. We prevailed in the Cold War because we inspired millions struggling for freedom in far corners of the Soviet empire. I have been in countries where children and avenues were named for Lincoln, Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. We were respected, not reviled, because we respected man's aspirations for peace and justice. This was the country to which foreign leaders sent not only their goods to be sold but their sons and daughters to be educated. In the 1930's, when Jewish and other scholars were driven out of Europe, their preferred destination - even for those on the far left - was not the Communist citadel in Moscow but the New School here in New York.
What has happened to our country? We have been in wars before, without resorting to sexual humiliation as torture, without blocking the Red Cross, without insulting and deceiving our allies and the U.N., without betraying our traditional values, without imitating our adversaries, without blackening our name around the world.
Last year when asked on short notice to speak to a European audience, and inquiring what topic I should address, the Chairman said: "Tell us about the good America, the America when Kennedy was in the White House." "It is still a good America," I replied. "The American people still believe in peace, human rights and justice; they are still a generous, fair-minded, open-minded people."
Today some political figures argue that merely to report, much less to protest, the crimes against humanity committed by a few of our own inadequately trained forces in the fog of war, is to aid the enemy or excuse its atrocities. But Americans know that such self-censorship does not enhance our security. Attempts to justify or defend our illegal acts as nothing more than pranks or no worse than the crimes of our enemies, only further muddies our moral image. 30 years ago, America's war in Vietnam became a hopeless military quagmire; today our war in Iraq has become a senseless moral swamp.
No military victory can endure unless the victor occupies the high moral ground. Surely America, the land of the free, could not lose the high moral ground invading Iraq, a country ruled by terror, torture and tyranny - but we did.
Instead of isolating Saddam Hussein - politically, economically, diplomatically, much as we succeeded in isolating Khadafy, Marcos, Mobutu and a host of other dictators over the years, we have isolated ourselves. We are increasingly alone in a dangerous world in which millions who once respected us now hate us.
Not only Muslims. Every international survey shows our global standing at an all-time low. Even our transatlantic alliance has not yet recovered from its worst crisis in history. Our friends in Western Europe were willing to accept Uncle Sam as class president, but not as class bully, once he forgot JFK's advice that "Civility is not a sign of weakness."
All this is rationalized as part of the war on terror. But abusing prisoners in Iraq, denying detainees their legal rights in Guantanamo, even American citizens, misleading the world at large about Saddam's ready stockpiles of mass destruction and involvement with al Qaeda at 9/11, did not advance by one millimeter our efforts to end the threat of another terrorist attack upon us. On the contrary, our conduct invites and incites new attacks and new recruits to attack us.
The decline in our reputation adds to the decline in our security. We keep losing old friends and making new enemies - not a formula for success. We have not yet rounded up Osama bin Laden or most of the al Qaeda and Taliban leaders or the anthrax mailer. "The world is large," wrote John Boyle O'Reilly, in one of President Kennedy's favorite poems, "when its weary leagues two loving hearts divide, but the world is small when your enemy is loose on the other side." Today our enemies are still loose on the other side of the world, and we are still vulnerable to attack.
True, we have not lost either war we chose or lost too much of our wealth. But we have lost something worse - our good name for truth and justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare: "He who steals our nation's purse, steals trash. T'was ours, tis his, and has been slave to thousands. But he that filches our good name ... makes us poor indeed."
No American wants us to lose a war. Among our enemies are those who, if they could, would fundamentally change our way of life, restricting our freedom of religion by exalting one faith over others, ignoring international law and the opinions of mankind; and trampling on the rights of those who are different, deprived or disliked. To the extent that our nation voluntarily trods those same paths in the name of security, the terrorists win and we are the losers.
We are no longer the world's leaders on matters of international law and peace. After we stopped listening to others, they stopped listening to us. A nation without credibility and moral authority cannot lead, because no one will follow.
Paradoxically, the charges against us in the court of world opinion are contradictory. We are deemed by many to be dangerously aggressive, a threat to world peace. You may regard that as ridiculously unwarranted, no matter how often international surveys show that attitude to be spreading. But remember the old axiom: "No matter how good you feel, if four friends tell you you're drunk, you better lie down."
Yet we are also charged not so much with intervention as indifference - indifference toward the suffering of millions of our fellow inhabitants of this planet who do not enjoy the freedom, the opportunity, the health and wealth and security that we enjoy; indifference to the countless deaths of children and other civilians in unnecessary wars, countless because we usually do not bother to count them; indifference to the centuries of humiliation endured previously in silence by the Arab and Islamic worlds.
The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.
When, in 1941, the Japanese Air Force was able to inflict widespread death and destruction on our naval and air forces in Hawaii because they were not on alert, those military officials most responsible for ignoring advance intelligence were summarily dismissed.
When, in the late 1940's, we faced a global Cold War against another system of ideological fanatics certain that their authoritarian values would eventually rule the world, we prevailed in time. We prevailed because we exercised patience as well as vigilance, self-restraint as well as self-defense, and reached out to moderates and modernists, to democrats and dissidents, within that closed system. We can do that again. We can reach out to moderates and modernists in Islam, proud of its long traditions of dialogue, learning, charity and peace.
Some among us scoff that the war on Jihadist terror is a war between civilization and chaos. But they forget that there were Islamic universities and observatories long before we had railroads.
So do not despair. In this country, the people are sovereign. If we can but tear the blindfold of self-deception from our eyes and loosen the gag of self-denial from our voices, we can restore our country to greatness. In particular, you - the Class of 2004 - have the wisdom and energy to do it. Start soon.
In the words of the ancient Hebrews:
"The day is short, and the work is great, and the laborers are sluggish, but the reward is much, and the Master is urgent."
In honor of the retirement of the founder of C-Span, Brian Lamb, and the subsequent end of Booknotes (yet another sign of decline), I will here post the full text of Sorenson’s speech and then open the floor to your comments.
A Time to Weep
by Ted Sorenson
This is not a speech. Two weeks ago I set aside the speech I prepared. This is a cry from the heart, a lamentation for the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness.
Future historians studying the decline and fall of America will mark this as the time the tide began to turn - toward a mean-spirited mediocrity in place of a noble beacon.
For me the final blow was American guards laughing over the naked, helpless bodies of abused prisoners in Iraq. "There is a time to laugh," the Bible tells us, "and a time to weep." Today I weep for the country I love, the country I proudly served, the country to which my four grandparents sailed over a century ago with hopes for a new land of peace and freedom. I cannot remain silent when that country is in the deepest trouble of my lifetime.
I am not talking only about the prison abuse scandal, that stench will someday subside. Nor am I referring only to the Iraq war - that too will pass - nor to any one political leader or party. This is no time for politics as usual, in which no one responsible admits responsibility, no one genuinely apologizes, no one resigns and everyone else is blamed.
The damage done to this country by its own misconduct in the last few months and years, to its very heart and soul, is far greater and longer lasting than any damage that any terrorist could possibly inflict upon us.
The stain on our credibility, our reputation for decency and integrity, will not quickly wash away.
Last week, a family friend of an accused American guard in Iraq recited the atrocities inflicted by our enemies on Americans, and asked: "Must we be held to a different standard?" My answer is YES. Not only because others expect it. WE must hold ourselves to a different standard. Not only because God demands it, but because it serves our security.
Our greatest strength has long been not merely our military might but our moral authority. Our surest protection against assault from abroad has been not all our guards, gates and guns or even our two oceans, but our essential goodness as a people. Our richest asset has been not our material wealth but our values.
We were world leaders once - helping found the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, NATO, and programs like Food for Peace, international human rights and international environmental standards. The world admired not only the bravery of our Marine Corps but also the idealism of our Peace Corps.
Our word was as good as our gold. At the start of the Cuban Missile Crisis, former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, President Kennedy's special envoy to brief French President de Gaulle, offered to document our case by having the actual pictures of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba brought in. "No," shrugged the usually difficult de Gaulle: "The word of the President of the United States is good enough for me."
Eight months later, President Kennedy could say at American University: "The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate ... we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just."
Our founding fathers believed this country could be a beacon of light to the world, a model of democratic and humanitarian progress. We were. We prevailed in the Cold War because we inspired millions struggling for freedom in far corners of the Soviet empire. I have been in countries where children and avenues were named for Lincoln, Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. We were respected, not reviled, because we respected man's aspirations for peace and justice. This was the country to which foreign leaders sent not only their goods to be sold but their sons and daughters to be educated. In the 1930's, when Jewish and other scholars were driven out of Europe, their preferred destination - even for those on the far left - was not the Communist citadel in Moscow but the New School here in New York.
What has happened to our country? We have been in wars before, without resorting to sexual humiliation as torture, without blocking the Red Cross, without insulting and deceiving our allies and the U.N., without betraying our traditional values, without imitating our adversaries, without blackening our name around the world.
Last year when asked on short notice to speak to a European audience, and inquiring what topic I should address, the Chairman said: "Tell us about the good America, the America when Kennedy was in the White House." "It is still a good America," I replied. "The American people still believe in peace, human rights and justice; they are still a generous, fair-minded, open-minded people."
Today some political figures argue that merely to report, much less to protest, the crimes against humanity committed by a few of our own inadequately trained forces in the fog of war, is to aid the enemy or excuse its atrocities. But Americans know that such self-censorship does not enhance our security. Attempts to justify or defend our illegal acts as nothing more than pranks or no worse than the crimes of our enemies, only further muddies our moral image. 30 years ago, America's war in Vietnam became a hopeless military quagmire; today our war in Iraq has become a senseless moral swamp.
No military victory can endure unless the victor occupies the high moral ground. Surely America, the land of the free, could not lose the high moral ground invading Iraq, a country ruled by terror, torture and tyranny - but we did.
Instead of isolating Saddam Hussein - politically, economically, diplomatically, much as we succeeded in isolating Khadafy, Marcos, Mobutu and a host of other dictators over the years, we have isolated ourselves. We are increasingly alone in a dangerous world in which millions who once respected us now hate us.
Not only Muslims. Every international survey shows our global standing at an all-time low. Even our transatlantic alliance has not yet recovered from its worst crisis in history. Our friends in Western Europe were willing to accept Uncle Sam as class president, but not as class bully, once he forgot JFK's advice that "Civility is not a sign of weakness."
All this is rationalized as part of the war on terror. But abusing prisoners in Iraq, denying detainees their legal rights in Guantanamo, even American citizens, misleading the world at large about Saddam's ready stockpiles of mass destruction and involvement with al Qaeda at 9/11, did not advance by one millimeter our efforts to end the threat of another terrorist attack upon us. On the contrary, our conduct invites and incites new attacks and new recruits to attack us.
The decline in our reputation adds to the decline in our security. We keep losing old friends and making new enemies - not a formula for success. We have not yet rounded up Osama bin Laden or most of the al Qaeda and Taliban leaders or the anthrax mailer. "The world is large," wrote John Boyle O'Reilly, in one of President Kennedy's favorite poems, "when its weary leagues two loving hearts divide, but the world is small when your enemy is loose on the other side." Today our enemies are still loose on the other side of the world, and we are still vulnerable to attack.
True, we have not lost either war we chose or lost too much of our wealth. But we have lost something worse - our good name for truth and justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare: "He who steals our nation's purse, steals trash. T'was ours, tis his, and has been slave to thousands. But he that filches our good name ... makes us poor indeed."
No American wants us to lose a war. Among our enemies are those who, if they could, would fundamentally change our way of life, restricting our freedom of religion by exalting one faith over others, ignoring international law and the opinions of mankind; and trampling on the rights of those who are different, deprived or disliked. To the extent that our nation voluntarily trods those same paths in the name of security, the terrorists win and we are the losers.
We are no longer the world's leaders on matters of international law and peace. After we stopped listening to others, they stopped listening to us. A nation without credibility and moral authority cannot lead, because no one will follow.
Paradoxically, the charges against us in the court of world opinion are contradictory. We are deemed by many to be dangerously aggressive, a threat to world peace. You may regard that as ridiculously unwarranted, no matter how often international surveys show that attitude to be spreading. But remember the old axiom: "No matter how good you feel, if four friends tell you you're drunk, you better lie down."
Yet we are also charged not so much with intervention as indifference - indifference toward the suffering of millions of our fellow inhabitants of this planet who do not enjoy the freedom, the opportunity, the health and wealth and security that we enjoy; indifference to the countless deaths of children and other civilians in unnecessary wars, countless because we usually do not bother to count them; indifference to the centuries of humiliation endured previously in silence by the Arab and Islamic worlds.
The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.
When, in 1941, the Japanese Air Force was able to inflict widespread death and destruction on our naval and air forces in Hawaii because they were not on alert, those military officials most responsible for ignoring advance intelligence were summarily dismissed.
When, in the late 1940's, we faced a global Cold War against another system of ideological fanatics certain that their authoritarian values would eventually rule the world, we prevailed in time. We prevailed because we exercised patience as well as vigilance, self-restraint as well as self-defense, and reached out to moderates and modernists, to democrats and dissidents, within that closed system. We can do that again. We can reach out to moderates and modernists in Islam, proud of its long traditions of dialogue, learning, charity and peace.
Some among us scoff that the war on Jihadist terror is a war between civilization and chaos. But they forget that there were Islamic universities and observatories long before we had railroads.
So do not despair. In this country, the people are sovereign. If we can but tear the blindfold of self-deception from our eyes and loosen the gag of self-denial from our voices, we can restore our country to greatness. In particular, you - the Class of 2004 - have the wisdom and energy to do it. Start soon.
In the words of the ancient Hebrews:
"The day is short, and the work is great, and the laborers are sluggish, but the reward is much, and the Master is urgent."
posted by The Declinist at 9:41 AM
0 comments
Monday, December 13, 2004
Peterson Dad
A jury unanimously sentenced former fertilizer salesman, Scott Peterson, to death today at 4:30 EST, in Redwood CA. Thus ends a two-year American obsession with the latest high-profile murder trial, which was mostly an obsession with Scott himself, whose smugness and arrogance captured our imaginations in that he became a national icon for that generic high school date rapist type, whom we all knew. I have no comments on the trial itself, the media frenzy, the prolonged Ken Burns zooms into Laciâs warm and toothy smile, the parallels to Robert Chambers. There are, however, a couple of instances--ancillary to the main media coverage of the verdict itself--that are more telling of our declinist state of affairs than the obvious statement that we have turned a murder trial into entertainment. First, while watching the verdict with a friend, we both noted with dismay that in the midst of the announcement of the Peterson verdict there scrolled across the bottom of the screen a single unsettling sentence, ââ¦Former General Augusto Pinochet was indicted in Santiago Chileâ¦â That was it. Now back to Scott. Is he going to fry or become someoneâs prison bitch, come on, come onâ¦we are a nation salivating.
Do we have our priorities straight here? The notorious political dictator of one of the worst regimes in the southern hemisphere is finally being brought to justice. Murderer of Salvador Allende in the CIA assisted Chilean coup of 1973, Architect of the DINA (a Gestapo tactics organization), commander of the âCaravan of Death,â a roving band of terror and murder is finally being indicted for the kidnapping of nine dissidents and the killing of one of them during his 17 year reign.
Does our narcissism have no limits? What it seems we really want to know is, did Scott show any emotion when he heard the verdict? He clenched his jaw, but that was it!â¦hmmm clenched his jaw did he? Wonder what that means?
Do we care about the thousands of desaparecidos? about nearly two decades of human rights violations? of the implications for our cuddly Dr. Kissenger if under oath Pinochet confesses to U.S. involvement in the coup? No, the question for us today is how loud was the cheer of the bloodthirsty mob outside of the courtroom in Redwood City, CA? Did Scottâs mom cry? When will Scott be transferred from his holding cell to death row? What did Laciâs sister wear?
Still need more evidence we are in decline?
Just take note of this picture posted on http://www.myway.com/ just after the verdict was announced. Here we have a dad (unrelated to the trial in any direct way) who has brought his four-year-old son to the Redwood City courthouse to spectate the announcement of this historic verdict. This photo is an important node of decline. Note how the boy is swathed in cartoonishly violent pajamas while talking on a cell phone. A cell phone!? Who on earth does a four year-old need to call from outside a courthouse? Note how he deftly wields the phone like a desensitized publicist or an irritated consumer on hold with customer service. Or perhaps he is checking his rollover minutes to see if he has enough time to call his playmates to gloat that he made it to the event of the year. Observe how the dad has ostentatiously supported his son atop his shoulders in a gesture of moral rectitude, as if to perform his normalcy for us all. HE certainly isnât a dad like Scott. Ahhâ¦but we know better. We can see the macabre underbelly to this little-league dad and his malevolent transmission to his young child of the spectator/mob mentality and a new culture of death. This moment very well may end up being one of the boyâs most formative memories, and what does that mean for us as a civilization? Certain Peril. If he doesnât remember it, it will most definitely lurk in his unconscious only to resurface again in an instant of suburban rage 20 years from now. Perhaps it will become a drunken night Hooters, or in incident of SUV road rage in the year 2025, it is hard to say, but the boyâs bearing witness to the Peterson courtroom trial will find its way out of the psyche. Now multiply that boy by a million.
Decline.
One thing is certain, in 20 years when this boy is asked, âWhere were you when Agusto Pinochet was indicted.â He will answer, âPino-who?â
Do we have our priorities straight here? The notorious political dictator of one of the worst regimes in the southern hemisphere is finally being brought to justice. Murderer of Salvador Allende in the CIA assisted Chilean coup of 1973, Architect of the DINA (a Gestapo tactics organization), commander of the âCaravan of Death,â a roving band of terror and murder is finally being indicted for the kidnapping of nine dissidents and the killing of one of them during his 17 year reign.
Does our narcissism have no limits? What it seems we really want to know is, did Scott show any emotion when he heard the verdict? He clenched his jaw, but that was it!â¦hmmm clenched his jaw did he? Wonder what that means?
Do we care about the thousands of desaparecidos? about nearly two decades of human rights violations? of the implications for our cuddly Dr. Kissenger if under oath Pinochet confesses to U.S. involvement in the coup? No, the question for us today is how loud was the cheer of the bloodthirsty mob outside of the courtroom in Redwood City, CA? Did Scottâs mom cry? When will Scott be transferred from his holding cell to death row? What did Laciâs sister wear?
Still need more evidence we are in decline?
Just take note of this picture posted on http://www.myway.com/ just after the verdict was announced. Here we have a dad (unrelated to the trial in any direct way) who has brought his four-year-old son to the Redwood City courthouse to spectate the announcement of this historic verdict. This photo is an important node of decline. Note how the boy is swathed in cartoonishly violent pajamas while talking on a cell phone. A cell phone!? Who on earth does a four year-old need to call from outside a courthouse? Note how he deftly wields the phone like a desensitized publicist or an irritated consumer on hold with customer service. Or perhaps he is checking his rollover minutes to see if he has enough time to call his playmates to gloat that he made it to the event of the year. Observe how the dad has ostentatiously supported his son atop his shoulders in a gesture of moral rectitude, as if to perform his normalcy for us all. HE certainly isnât a dad like Scott. Ahhâ¦but we know better. We can see the macabre underbelly to this little-league dad and his malevolent transmission to his young child of the spectator/mob mentality and a new culture of death. This moment very well may end up being one of the boyâs most formative memories, and what does that mean for us as a civilization? Certain Peril. If he doesnât remember it, it will most definitely lurk in his unconscious only to resurface again in an instant of suburban rage 20 years from now. Perhaps it will become a drunken night Hooters, or in incident of SUV road rage in the year 2025, it is hard to say, but the boyâs bearing witness to the Peterson courtroom trial will find its way out of the psyche. Now multiply that boy by a million.
Decline.
One thing is certain, in 20 years when this boy is asked, âWhere were you when Agusto Pinochet was indicted.â He will answer, âPino-who?â
posted by The Declinist at 4:53 PM
1 comments
Friday, December 03, 2004
Why They Hate Us 12/3/2004
Good news declinist readers! I am pleased to present to you the first installment of what will become our weekly Friday feature, Why They Hate Us. Every Friday The Declinist will post a single link to/image of decline so potent, so overwhelmingly self-explanatory, that it need no critical commentary. Nevertheless, in the spirit of feedback, I welcome you all to reply with your own thoughts on the Friday feature. I also encourage you to send your own submissions for Why They Hate Us Fridays; we are always looking for good posts. You can email your images or links to declinist@hotmail.com.
And now I give you the first Why They Hate Us feature: “The Hummer Limo”
posted by The Declinist at 1:30 AM
1 comments
Thursday, December 02, 2004
Declinist Product Watch: Ionic Breeze
Difficult to express accurately with words, for some incalculable reason the Ionic Breeze is, for me, a potent sign of decline. For some time now I have reviled the television advertisements that push this dreadful little devise on us with fake enthusiasm and broken promises. These ads laud the ingenuity of its “filterless” system that “traps airborne pollutants on stainless steel blades.” Its patented design permits you to run it ceaselessly while only having to occasionally rinse or wipe blades clean with a damp cloth. No more filters to change, no more fan motors to fret about, no more sky-high electricity bills. Ionic progress. But what these fantastic exaggerations fail to address is the one question that should be foremost on all of our minds. Since when, exactly, did the air become so filthy, so horrifically polluted, that we need the Ionic Breeze in the first place? The Sharper Image website boasts that you can run the Ionic Breeze for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, all while using a minimal amount of electricity. 24 hours a day!? Has it come to this? Are things this dire? Do we as a nation really need this much air filtration? And if we do should the people at Ionic Breeze be profiting from the spoils of global pollution?
But the declinist nature of the I.B. is most ostensibly visible in its putrid design. Just look at it, standing there…it’s absolutely hideous…some kind of alien monstrosity that has been installed in your house to silently monitor your life functions. It resembles a gleaming office tower in the Atlanta skyline, or maybe Houston. When you pull those steely blades out to wipe them off the I.B. is instantly converted into some kind of gargantuan medical probe. Just imagine the I.B. as a blight in your living room, or giving your young children nightmares as it purrs away in their bedroom day and night, hovering there in its “attractive lightweight housing” vigilantly cleansing the air to save their tiny pink lungs from certain peril. How on earth have we become complacent about the terrifying implications of this machine? This obsession we have with air filtration points to a disturbing need in our collective psyche: the demented assumption that the very air we breathe is contaminated and causing us great harm. The thriving I.B. culture in the United States today implies that we are a sick nation, hermetically sealed away in our houses wrapped in Tyvek, trembling at the thought of carpet odors, pet hair, dust motes, pollutants, CFCs, spores, pathogens, airborne viruses, and other miasmic intrusions that circulate invisibly around us, silently collecting in our lung tissue and rupturing our helpless alveoli sacks.
Then again, perhaps the danger is real and we must remain vigilant and struggle against the grave and gathering threat of the air we breathe. We will not give up, we will prevail, we will emerge in pulmonary triumph from the air around us, we will not rest until every molecule of air is pure, until every room in ‘murica has an I.B.
posted by The Declinist at 1:36 AM
1 comments
