Robert,
My library book on Keynsian economics says basically
the same thing. If your economy is in trouble start a war.
(I can hear the apologist's keyboards rattle, "Marx
wasn't an economist and Keynes didn't mean it.")
One of the things that no one would consider (because
it doesn't fit, into the "exploiters as progressives" mode),
would be to return to the greatest use of Iron in the
19th century. Turn those swords and old automobiles
into piano frames!
We have such "ideas" about giving (or not) money
away to that 40% or so of the population, that will not
have the regular (exploitation and pollute) jobs, that
we would rather argue about the meaning of drudge
work than to come up with work that delights the eye,
caresses the ear and makes the idea of tearing an
eye from the socket or an arm from the shoulder acceptable
only in a play. Better crime in the street from abused
populations or war to lower that population and offer
puberty rites than to have a play and self reflection on
that brutality. Better to have a burial then have
Wilfred Owen rise at the end of his poems and take
a bow.
Yes Brad, these are sacrifices that are like
the ones you deplore. But the real sacrifice would
have been to have this poet home writing about culture
in the way he wrote about war. He could have written
the 20th century version of Blake's economic
observations:
"Where are thy father & mother? say?
They are both gone up to the church to pray.
Because I was happy upon the heath,
And smil'd among the winters snow:
They clothed me in the clothes of death.
And taught me to sing the notes of woe.
And because I am happy, & dance & sing.
They think they have done me no injury"
And are gone to praise God & and his Priest & King
Who make a heaven of our misery."
======================
Brutality is not legislated away or solved by repression
in children. It should be played out on the stage, not
the stage of life, but the stage where people, both professional
and amateur, can act the great lessons of life and explore
the meanings of the composers and poets, the great
ideals of their history, their present and their dreams.
Since no one seemed to like my last post on this,
I will let it go. I have much to do but I find this all very
discouraging and more than a little cowardly on the
part of those who are at present doing the "naming
of the valuables" in society. So I go into lurking with
a little Chinese wisdom from a dialogue with
that great futurist Confucius:
If it happens that one entrusts you
with the government,
what would you do first?
"I would begin with correct definitions!"
But that is far afield,
Why should the Government bother?
"When the names are not correct,
then the language does not fit.
When the language does not fit,
then the actions will not be complete.
When the actions are not complete,
then civility does not blossom.
When civility does not blossom,
then authority falters.
And when authority falters
then the people do not know were
to put their hands and feet.
Therefore the wise scholar gives names
such that language becomes possible,
And uses language in such a way that
wise action becomes possible. "
==============================
"Giving meaning to words is a creative act
leading to manifestations in the real world"
Winfried Dressler
==============================
A public leader needs to be
> 1. ...in possession of the cultural inheritance.
and needs to be qualified to
> 2. ...participate in the contemporary world.
> 3. ...contribute to the civilization of the future.
John Warfield
===============================
As for Michael's Brain Drain, (CBD)
America is currently filled with Canadian Culture and
performing artists bringing millions of dollars back into
the economy of Toronto in particular and Canada
generally. It has worked for America's balance of
trade payments, I suspect that a smaller country and
a smaller population will benefit even more.
However Canada has decided to go on the same
"profit as the only value" binge that is currently
infecting America's heart and brain. So the Canada
Council, that jewel of North America, is probably on
the way out, in which case you had better be prepared
to compete with the giant to your south in the
entertainment market place. Remember what happened
to that wonderful Canadian "share the profits between
projects" producer Garth Drabinsky. He met American
"profit is the only value" shareholders and they crashed
his empire. It isn't pretty.
There are a lot more of your people working
in Nova Scotia and around your country in the culture
industries than ours are here, primarily because of
what was an enlighted attitude on the part of the
Canadian people. Where America gives less than a
dollar per person to subsidize the arts, the last time
I looked, Canada gave several dollars per person
and Hollywood and the music business is hiring
your people and using your studios at the current
time as a result.
It is not all about slightly skilled labor and drudge jobs
but about the cultivation and training of incredibly
complicated skills and how much your society is
committed to it.
I keep remembering that wonderful Nova Scotia movie
about miner's wives and a museum with a dead husband's
pickled "private parts in it. It was like that
where I grew up as well. I remember going by the mining
office every day to feel the dried lower arm of a man killed
in the mines. How light it was, like paper almost. We
cheered the end of mining accidents, cave-ins and silicosis
and practiced the piano to give beauty to our lives. A lot less
money but living in hell for a price is no bargain. If you were
hungry you just practiced more. Right now Canadians are
making good lives in the movies and the music business.
It is inconceivable to one who has ridden the "can" down 800
feet into the cold earth never knowing when a stone would come
loose from the cribbing and meet your head leaving you dead
before work even began, that this work would be glorified.
It is inconceivable that there is the glory in the hard monotony
and danger of the factory. I know a very fine tenor who
worked a couple of days in the steel mill until he saw a man
embraced by an errant coil of red hot wire. He left and
rejoined the Army where it was safer, (during Vietnam no
less )and where he could continue his voice lessons on
his off duty time.
Canadians are making good livings in the movies and
music business. That is the present as a result of the
Canada Council's past thirty years of excellence.
But that too will pass.
Academia and the number crunchers are hard at work
naming things to their's, the warrior's, the exploiter's and
the polluter's advantage.
cynically yours
REH
