Freedom of Speech Stabbed in the Gut!!!

There is a tough-speaking, half-intelligent, bizarre-looking old guy on the radio every morning ... until a few days ago, I'm only vaguely aware of this. Now, of course, everybody knows who he is. The following is one blogger's reaction to the whole "Imus" thing.

1. I resisted writing a blog after Sharpton called for him to be fired, and Jackson protested outside the studio with 50 followers.

2. I resisted writing a blog after Imus went on Sharpton's show and apologized, and Sharpton still called for his firing.

3. I resisted writing a blog after MSNBC dropped the feed, and Sharpton said this wasn't enough.

4. I resisted writing a blog when Sharpton appeared on Good-Morning America accusing Imus of repeatedly using "the n-word." Turns out, Sharpton was talking about the word "nappy."

5. I resisted writing a blog when sponsers continued to desert ship, and CBS inevitably fired the 30-year radio veteran.

6. I resisted writing a blog when Imus still went through with his meeting with the Rutgers women, despite having been fired, and Sharpton still said this wasn't enough.

7. Now Sharpton says Imus was "never the issue," and that it's time to show the media that sexism and racism will no longer be tolerated.

I must blog.

You see, there is a reason I resisted writing a blog. Well, two, actually. One is, I swore a long time ago (round about the time the last presidential election was wrapping up) that politics and social-current-events were a vicious and contemptible game ... something I no longer wanted a part of. My early blogs (ilprimopazzo.blogspot.com) were very political, but that quickly changed - and hasn't changed back. The second reason I wished to avoid the issue was because, in my mind, this was just typical Sharpton/Jackson scare-tactics, and the whole thing would blow over. I assumed everybody else saw it this way too - I mean, it is Sharpton and Jackson we're talking about. It's not as if Barack Obama or Colin Powell were the ones freaking out here. No, it was just America's usual self-absorbed, power-hungry, television celebrities ... at it again.

WRONG!

The days passed, Imus' humiliation grew, his disgrace became cemented, his tears blew out the electric circuits in our television sets and smeared the words in our newspapers, and the wicked partnership of Jackson/Sharpton has new life. It has a new leg to stand on in carrying out its campaign of censurship and fear. One wonders what might have happened if Imus had just listened to Howard Stern, who told the media "He should have just said, fuck you, it's a joke." Perhaps if he'd have taken a stance, people would have rallied behind him, and the whole thing WOULD have blown over after a week or so of hot air and angry faces back and forth. But who is going to follow a cowering old half-famous sissy who won't stand up for himself?

The point isn't that what Imus said was just peachy. Sure, much worse has been said, but in this case one must consider the outlet. It is not as if Imus' show is broadcast on Comedy Central. He speaks to an audience that is already uptight, opinionated, and totally lacking a sense of humor. He might be a "shock jock," but he doesn't reach the same folks that Howard Stern is rapping to. So, from that context, you've got to be careful about what you say, and calling college athletes "Nappy-headed hos," (the n-word according to Sharpton) is the type of thing that makes the waters around you start to boil a bit. Of course there was going to be indignation and calls for an apology.

But that is where it should end, friends! This issue goes way beyond racism and sexism ... it has been elevated, by Sharpton/Jackson, and subsequently by MSNBC and CBS to the wide-world of free-speechism. This is a creepy and unfriendly America we're living in, I'm afraid, if 2nd-rate "shock-jocks" can be nationally disgraced and fired from their jobs for saying "nappy-headed hos." The fact is, no matter what Jackson/Sharpton tell you, that this is only a very vaguely offensive thing to say, and only to a small group of people. For anybody to have gotten offended by this who was not a Rutger's player, or somehow associated with the Rutger's program, or a close friend/relative of a Rutger's athlete, was an exercise in pre-conditioned this-is-how-I'm-supposed-to-react garbage. It was feigned indignation. It was let-me-show-you-that-I'm-not-racist-or-sexist-and-these-things-enrage-me indignation. It was certainly not legitimate. A) there is very little, if anything wrong with calling somebody nappy-headed - this is a term that means, simply, "kinky, fuzzy" and "small, tight curls." B) the real issue is his use of the word "hos" - and the word, taken literally, is an unfair, and sexist thing to say about college athletes who haven't done anything to deserve it, but the issue has been raised by several subsequent articles/blogs which asks - was the term being used "ironically" rather than literally? In other words, was Imus, in his own "shock jock" mind, mimicing a widely-used hip-hop cliche, rather than literally calling these girls "hos." I think the answer is almost assuredly YES, but that doesn't excuse it - it just tones it down somewhat. The word is not a flattering one, even as a hip-hop cliche, so while he may not have meant it literally, he still used an insulting cliche.

But let's be honest, chums ... considering all of the above, this is a mildly offensive statement, especially given that it originated on shock-jock programming. It's not as if a CNN news anchor said this - in other words, it was spoken to an audience that expects to hear things like that. This DOES make a huge difference, whether some people want to admit it or not. Context plays a role, I'm afraid.

So, let me bring this thing home, here. What has got me so irritated about this whole shameful disaster is not A) that there's no more Imus show - I barely knew who he was, and I don't watch or listen to political programming. He could have quit for totally unrelated reasons a month ago, and I'm not sure I'd have even noticed. It was not B) that I'm very happy about what he said and think more people should be called nappy-headed hos. What has me so disgusted here, is C) that freedom-of-speech took a stab-wound to the gut after this whole affair. It's a simple formula here, when you step back and look at the whole affair: shock-jock says a vaguely offensive thing, and opportunistic spotlight seekers force us to take his job away from him. Not that CBS and MSNBC fired him because Sharpton/Jackson said so ... no, but sponsers pulled out because Sharpton/Jackson told them to, and high-profile guests cancelled appearances because Sharpton/Jackson told them to. And Sharpton/Jackson told them to, because they want to continue to be rich and famous and powerful, and not because they are motivated by any great cause. So the whole damn thing comes down to money. This whole nightmare was a fucking business transaction. That's a sad fucking state-of-affairs, if you ask this depressed blogger.

Whatever the case -- Sharpton now says its not over, and it wasn't about Imus. So let's see what he does. If he's really motivated at all by even the most infintessimal of stirrings that resemble a "noble cause," then he'll go after somebody who isn't helpless for a change. You see, there's no money and easy-score where bigshots are concerned. Take on Howard Stern or South Park, and watch how fast Sharpton himself is the one being shit on and disgraced. No, he'll never do that. Why? Because he has no cause. I'm not saying there isn't "a cause," I'm just pointing out that Sharpton doesn't have anything to do with it, and most people recognize this in some way. So he'll keep doing what he does best ... bullying helpless people for the quick fame, the quick money. He'll keep exploiting real historical and on-going tragedies like racism and sexism to make himself a wealthy and powerful man, and in so doing he'll continue to turn these actual-factual evils into parodies of themselves that are taken less and less seriously. And all of this is a shame. But the biggest shame of all, in the final analysis, is that freedom-of-speech takes another one for the team. It endures another savage beating at the hands of those who want to force us into a PG-rated culture, where nobody says anything that could be construed by anyone, anywhere as remotely offensive. When a 30-year-veteran can't go on the air and say the phrase "Nappy-headed hos" without being nationally humiliated and terminated from his job ... well, it makes Sharpton's word all the more frightening; if Imus wasn't an isolated issue, then what is in store for our entertainment culture?

Despite all this, however, I do believe Imus was an isolated incident. I think most people walk away from this going, "Wow, that was fucking ridiculous!" And what does that mean? It means next time self-glorifying facists try to pull that shit, people will be ready for them ... no desperate, tear-riddled apologies and no roll-over-and-die surrenders. The next person who has to face it will be ready to tell Sharpton/Jackson to fuck themselves, and maybe free-speech will recover from such a blatant violation and rotten injustice like this whole "Imus thing."

Cheers.

Supermassive (Part the Second)

(DO NOT READ THIS UNLESS YOU HAVE ALREADY READ THE FIRST PART, POSTED JUST PREVIOUS TO THIS)

And now, old chums ... Part 2:

This is all fiction. You need to understand that. My name is Mike Sherry, and I’m a writer. Well, I want to be a writer.

There is a theory I like that states: Anything that can happen will happen. Not here, but “elsewhere.” A scientific theory that there are an infinite number of universes, which means anything that can possibly be conceived of, does in fact exist. This is a fiction writer’s dream. Think of the possibilities of that. That means that somewhere, in another universe, I’m an accomplished fiction writer. That also means I’m a homeless junkie, a tap dancer, a refrigerator repairman, a dragon, and anything else I can possibly imagine. A brilliant physicist, for instance. And there are infinite universes in which every experience I’ve ever had played out differently. When my Varsity Hockey team lost in the playoffs to Orchard Park two years in a row – we won. When I graduated Magna Cum Laude from undergraduate college – I struggled hopelessly and flunked out in less than a year. When I crashed my truck into a tree and a roommate caught me trying to cut my wrists in a drunken craze – I died. Literally, it’s only a matter of taking, for instance, “X” and turning it into “-X.” A simple application of reversal.

And I’ll start by sitting down at my computer and writing the words “Elvis Lives.”

* * *

I’d managed somehow to overlook the growing suspicion among my colleagues that I was somehow dangerous. I failed to see their point.

A word or two on my work would be useful at this stage, I think.

As you already are aware, I, Michael Sherry, am a physicist. That’s the “short” of it. My research centers around structuring the Universe. Well – not “the” Universe, but the outermost dimension in which everything is contained. I mean everything. You follow?

Maybe a little background would help. When scientists first uncovered the difficulty with gravity – namely that whenever one tries to apply the rules of Quantum Field Theory to General Relativity, gravity is apparently unable to fit into this scheme – they realized a new universal theory was needed. This led to String Theory, or the idea that the fundamental building blocks of the universe are strings that can be open like hair or closed like loops. This, ultimately, was a disaster. There were five of them. It is hardly a good thing to have five versions of a theory when you’re trying to posit it as a “theory of everything.”

One interesting aspect of the String Theories was their proposal of space-time in ten dimensions – a stretch, it seemed, at first, but consider that six of the dimensions are curled up very tightly so as to escape our comprehension. M-Theory took the next step.

11th Dimension.

And yet space-time still appears ten-dimensional. Well, that is because they exist within the 11th. We can’t “see” the 11th because it is outside of our comprehension – AKA our Universe. So, to put it simply, our universe is floating around inside an outer membrane which contains, in theory, an infinite number of universes.

This is where my work comes in. There is a theory that the universe is moving from organization to chaos. My research concentrates on a personal theory that EVERYTHING is moving from chaos to more chaos – infinite universes, the Eleventh Dimension, and all. Not just this universe.

This is what began my association with Dr. Jeff. Since Supermassive Black Holes might well be the endgame for everything – and since they’re entropy is incalculably high – it seemed a natural partnership.

But how to study such a thing? It should be theoretically impossible to comprehend something that is located outside of our physical universe. In other words, we’re only capable of operating within the confines of physical laws as they exist here. So how can we hope to capture something whose entity is beyond and around our physical laws. In other words – how do we study what is not here, but there?

Impossible.

Well, not necessarily. Consider – there are, in theory, an infinite number of other universes. An infinite number. Sounds like a throwaway term for “a-hell-of-a-lot-of” to your average non-physicist, but to the mathematically functioning mind of a scientist the concept is a nightmare. The idea that no number can be assigned. No theory or law made applicable. An infinite number! Don’t they realize what they are saying?

We did. And we embraced it. An infinite number means, to put it gently … anything goes. Infinite, by definition, means that anything one can possibly imagine exists. It does exist. Not some variation, or something very similar. No. If you can conceive of it, then it is out there. Somewhere.

So, we reasoned, in order to study a separate universe, all one has to do is read a book. Look at a drawing. Watch a movie. Go to sleep and have a dream. Are you getting this? It is all out there because of the illimitableness of parallel worlds. Write a poem, watch an opera, listen to a song.

Fiction, therefore, was the answer. The key to discovering truth rested in lies. This lends new meaning to the notion that the poets are the unelected spokesmen of a society. A society, it turns out, that exists farther away than they could possibly have imagined. But it does exist.

I therefore read, observed, listened and made careful notation of various descents toward chaos. My hope was to find some connection – some commonality between the thousands of “universes.” Something that would suggest a theory behind the growing disorganization of EVERYTHING.

This is, of course, why my colleagues found me dangerous, as it would turn out. The work Dr. Jeff and I were undertaking was threatening to undermine the very foundation of science – the idea that everything has an explanation, the universe(s) operates according to pre-determined physical principles, and only direct study can bring it to the surface. And here I was, apparently a renegade, studying the arts as a basis for universal understanding. I lost my job at the University and patrons of physics refused to fund my work.

Dr. Jeff, who was permitted to continue in the field since his study of black holes still rested in scientific analysis, continued our partnership in private.

And that is what landed us in Duff’s, enjoying chicken wings and a few beers after the Elvis concert

“Alright,” I said, finally. “Alright. Look. Remember when I sent you that email the other day? The one letting you know Elvis was coming back to Buffalo for the first time in almost a decade? Do you remember how it started?”

“The e-mail?” Dr. Jeff asks, confused. “I think it started with my name and then-

“No, I don’t mean the body. I mean the subject line. Do you remember what that said?”

“Oh,” he said, thinking back. “‘Elvis Lives’, right? Something like that?”

“That’s right,” I told him. “‘Elvis Lives.’” I signaled to a waitress that we needed a new pitcher. She came over to retrieve the empty pitcher, and headed off to the kitchen. I reached down and pulled a folder from my briefcase. “Take a look at this,” I told him, extracting a few photocopied sheets and handing them across the table.

He started reading …

This is all fiction. You need to understand that. My name is Mike Sherry, and I’m a writer.

This failed to impress him.

“What’s your point? What is this anyway?”

“It’s from a book I started reading just after I sent you that email. It’s called Supermassive.”

“So a character has the same name as you?”

“Yes, but look at this.” I flipped through a couple sheets and pointed to where I’d underlined certain lines in pencil.

“Read that.”

He began reading again …

And I’ll start by sitting down at my computer and writing the words “Elvis Lives.”