Television has taken on the role of the microwave – it cooks your brain in seconds!

The entire media scene reminds me of that scam played on the street where you have to figure out which card is the king, or under which cup the little red ball is - the presenter in the role of the dextrous scam artist and their co-presenters and guest speakers, in those silly pop up windows, in the role of the seemingly innocent bystander who plays and wins. Their purpose and objective, beyond the ratings (which helps them retain their jobs), is the daily stupefaction of the mob and deliberate misinformation of their viewers. The end justifies the means and so they draw attention away from the problems that the system has – the system that has always rightly treated us as a mob. If people do not stop lapping up everything they serve us, the worst is yet to come. So, participate in any kind of “peaceful protest” and group together with all of the others victims (but stay away from any partisan embraces which openly divide our dynamics). first posted - Sunday, December 14th, 2008

The “System” does not bear the burden of the edification of our children – the responsibility is ours!

There is no doubt that the system wants uneducated, anti-social materialistic and easily led “zombies”; the question is, what are we doing about it? Are we fulfilling our obligation as parents, or have we delegated this too to the television? How much of our personal time and space do we give them? Do we devote ourselves to them as much as we should or do we simply pay for their needs? What standards are we setting for them with our actions? Do we follow what is good, correct and just, or do we show them that the only thing we care about is ourselves and how we can get by? These questions are merciless (as are many others), but they are very useful as they may help us realize our derelictions. I recently read, somewhere on the Internet, that fathers nowadays devote less than 1 minute a day to their children (they mean the actual time they concentrate on their children – not just plopped in front of the TV with them, or at the dinner table or dealing with other responsibilities). I don’t know if this is reality, but if it is I find it frightening and grievous. I won’t continue, I will simply finish with a line from a relevant poem from my first collection, “Woe The State of Things”, entitled “Edification”: No person born bears responsibility, yet I know not what will happen to those that made the decision to bring them into this world….. And in closing I would like to say that as far as Rocco’s and Aggelos’s (my children) ethics and values are concerned, I am solely responsible, the “system” had nothing to do with them. (first posted - December 4, 2008)