The Appearance of Failure
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[This is a new and current post.] The things I've had to live through all these years I've been blogging at this web site: getting ripped off by rock stars and movie stars and major corporations like Telus, getting preyed upon by the broadcast media, having my image constantly assaulted by web frauds who steal my posts, and then having to try to convince my readers that I'm right and their TV's and radios are wrong. I've been insulted by every stranger on the bus. I've been mocked by schoolchildren. I've endured the most horrible accounts of how my music and comedy was turned into a vast celebration of hate behind my back. And let's not forget the poverty I suffered while frauds got rich with my best posts. But the news reporters only want to talk about other scandals, the ones that leave them looking innocent. All that matters today is appearances, rather than substance. When people want to be stars, they want to have the illusion of greatness but not necessarily the talent or personality or experience to back it up. All those dozens of fake stars that were largely unknown until they stole my posts in 2007, for instance, had no interest in achieving great work. The great work was apparently all done and they just wanted the appearance of greatness that came from lying and telling the world it was theirs. They were happy with this fake greatness - as long as they were the only ones who knew about it. They were people of whom Dostoevsky might have written found comfort in deceiving themselves. I was shocked and depressed to see the level of support our broadcasters had for such plagiarizing monsters. But the networks' and labels' idea of helping me was to try to put me on a televised stage where I could be surrounded by my enemies and forced to compete against my own music and comedy in front of the world. However, if I want all my work to have my name on it as its author, they ignore me. It shows that they have little regard for talent in the broadcasting world anymore, and maybe you've noticed the commensurate drop in quality from the kind of programming they offer you now. I know I certainly have. New music is so boring. It's always in 4/4 time with a childishly short chord progression that repeats and repeats and repeats while some fool chants a lot of obnoxious street slang in iambic pentameter on top of it. Or, if it's a full song with an actual melody, it sounds like something I would write and then throw away before I let anyone hear it. New songwriters always think everything they write is brilliant, but their listeners know better. I can't wait for them to grow up and hear how bad their music truly is. Nobody seems to have much comedy to offer either, at least nothing very good. That isn't surprising since it is so hard to produce good, effective comedy. It takes brains and effort, not a mere desire to be rich and famous. But brains and effort? Broadcasters don't give a damn about that. I may be most disappointed with the new documentaries. I downloaded BBC's latest History of the World last week, which turned out to be a mistake. The music is awful and too loud, drowning out the narration. I presume it's meant to stop you from falling asleep. And the series's focus tries to be too cosmopolitan. If it's talking about 1349, for example, I want to hear about the Plague in Europe, not about some community of penguins in Antarctica that just constructed their first igloo. (I just made that penguin part up, but it's close to the real content.) Do people only want to watch educational shows with a lot of violence and silly thumping in the background? Are they more concerned with how people look in a documentary than with its accuracy and substance? Gee, maybe education is wasted on them. Ah, but not the illusion of education. |
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| © 2020. Statements by David Skerkowski. All rights reserved. |
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