Technology Will Not Set Us Free

"..Blow up the TV
Blow up the car
Without these things
You don't know where you are..."
Toyah 'I Want To Be Free' (1981)

What's So Great About A Telephone?

A largely unseen and unknown group of people, commonly referred to by the others - the pack consumers (packcons) - as "THEY", will continue to devise new technology, promoted in a condescendingly indoctrinating fashion, by massive amounts of multi-media advertising. All human beings on the planet are "targeted" by the elite materialist fanatics of Big Business, and the few of us who can see the System for pretty much what it is, are surrounded and outnumbered by the others - the packcons. We, who don't see cars, mobile phones and other ubiquitous, often health-damaging technology as being brilliant, or even very interesting, are surely judged by them to be, at best, weird and/or stupid.

It used to be quite simple, straightforward and healthy. You had a telephone in your home, with numbers on it to dial. There were telephone boxes around town that you could use when there was some rare, important reason. The way to speak to people you really wanted to speak with was 'face to face'. There was no doubt about that; but, every now and then, you might phone up, or be telephoned by someone, either to make arrangements of some sort, or, because the other person lived too far away for you to be able to often see them. A telephone was only a secondary form of communication - nothing very special; nothing to get excited about; not a thing to periodically 'update'; not worth spending much money on. Just... quite a good thing to have around for the occasions when you had a use for it.

A man in a park, with a pack of dogs surrounding him. He is smartly dressed and holds a bag, which he opens up. Reaching in, he pulls out bone after bone and throws them out to quite a distance away.. And, as he does this, the multitude of dogs rush off towards the flying and landing bones. These bones have little or no meat on them; but, nevertheless, the dogs, on reaching them, grip them firmly, possessively in their mouths, and dart around, repeatedly glancing back at the smartly dressed man. The looks convey the impression of obedience and appreciation: as if the bones are what these dogs really, really want - nothing in Heaven and Earth more desirable to them than bones to chew on.

There was a time when I used to get the sense, from predictions I saw in the media, of what life in the future would be like - that technology would make life simpler and easier for people. But, much of recent technology is dedicated to making life more complicated. I still have a telephone which allows you to speak to and hear a caller immediately you pick up the receiver. But, there are other phones that people now have in their homes, which require you to, not only pick them up, but, also, press a button, before you can get through to the line the caller is on. This is not progress - it is making life more difficult. As well as making human everyday existence more complex, and fixating unwarranted significance onto a mediocre, secondary form of communication, these types of phone are constantly 'on', endlessly streaming out toxic radiation into the environment they operate in.   

The Rampant Polluters Drive On, Complaining About Others

Among the bizarrest examples of illogical thinking I've ever encountered are those provided by car drivers who complain about cigarette smokers. At times in the past, I've heard those who drive on roads, in town, condemning people smoking cigarettes outside buildings, on the pavement. To any rational person, it is obvious that it is the drivers on the road who, as well as taking up considerably more valuable space, and (unlike the smokers) making a terrible noise, are, also, pumping out far, far more poisonous chemicals at innocent human beings in their vicinity ('pedestrians'/'cyclists') than the smokers do.

When there is such a vast amount of harm being done, to human beings and other forms of life, by the very large number of car drivers, as well as by the smaller numbers of other road vehicle users, it is absurd for anyone to point their finger at the cigarette smokers' comparatively trivial activity, on the pavement. It is rather like a situation whereby regular talks are given in a large hall, with an audience in attendance. While the talks take place and the crowd listens, a few mice are scurrying around the outside perimeter of the hall and herds of loudly stampeding elephants run, almost continuously, through the centre of the hall, towards the far exits. The elephants are driven and whipped to run, into and across the hall, by people on the outside. Some of these people, who are themselves responsible for the stampeding elephants, complain about the few quiet mice on the edges, saying how "filthy" and "unsightly" they are.

Recently, there have also been discussions about people who smoke in vehicles that carry children. This is said to be bad, and, supposedly, should be made illegal, because of the harm that the cigarette smoker does to the child, or children, on board. Again, here we have a bizarre discussion, whereby we are expected to believe that these complainers about cigarette smoking within road vehicles really, really care about the health of children. As we listen to their argument, we note, perplexedly, that they mention nothing of the poor children who walk along pavements and cross roads, outside of the lit-cigarette-bearing road vehicle... the children who are remorselessly subjected to the deadly toxic chemicals that this very same vehicle is emitting. Classically, one complainer, during a radio discussion, alluding to the effects of so-called passive smoke within a car, commented: "You wouldn't want to see a cigarette in the mouth of a child, would you?" I don't know about you, but I'd personally far rather see a cigarette in a child's mouth than a car exhaust pipe.        

A Relentless Mania To Persuade

I have here an unopened, larger than A4-size envelope, received circa-December 2012. At upper-left of the front of it is a rectangular transparent window, within which my home address is printed. Below that, is a row of letters and digits, in two clusters. Above, and to the right of this row, are three further rows of digits, in five separate parts. At top-right of the front of this envelope is stated: UKMAIL express parcels & mail, and, in the top-right corner box: Delivered by Royal Mail C9 10001. On the opposite corner, at back of the envelope, directed downwards, it says: recycle. At centre-right (also text downwards): Return address: PO Box 691, Halifax HX1 TWB. Finally, along the lower-left, horizontal text reads: This package contains promotional material from Virgin Media.

Prior to receiving this large envelope, I had already received, perhaps, approximately 15-20 separate mailings from this same company regarding their broadband service. Those earlier mailings came in a variety of formats, and included one or more examples of special limited offers repeatedly emphasized, among the propagandising spiel, that was seeking to persuade me to accept and pay for their service, rather than the one I was already committed to. If, when I first started getting this unwanted commercial propaganda, I'd been aware of how much more of it that I would continue to be the recipient of, from the same company - all trying to lure me towards the same narrow consumerist goal - I would now have a big pile of the stuff, which could be referred to, at any time, as a reminder, a resonant testament to the fanatical, predatory mania of Big Business.

But, don't worry, folks, all is not lost: since getting the first large envelope, which I decided to retain, four further large envelopes have been delivered to me...

The first of them, received January 2013, has the same address and similar letter/digit arrangements on the rectangular viewing area (some lines of letters/digits are the same as on the first envelope, some differ). On this Propaganda Envelope 2, there is also a downward-directed bar code beneath UKMail express parcels & mail. On the viewing area of Propaganda Envelope 3, received February 2013, the clusters of letters and digits are differently arranged. One line of five digits and one line of letters and digits are identical to those found on the earlier two envelopes. The barcode is still vertical in relation to the other content; but, now, is in the lower-left area. Propaganda Envelope 3, delivered March 11th, has a barcode in the top-right again; but, printed on a rectangular sticker, or pasted-on paper, rather than being printed on the actual envelope. The format of text within the viewing area is similar to Prop.Env.3 - other external detail not different. The most recently received Prop.Env (April 10th) doesn't differ any more significantly from the three earlier unwanted arrivals than they differ from each other. It is the same general idea from outward appearances.

This company is so prolific with their advertising propaganda. They behave as if there is an endless supply of money available to them to churn it out at us. It will be interesting to discover to what (if any) extent they continue to send these large envelopes and/or other material to me, in the months and years to come.

Drifting Towards Total Surveillance

When I was in my teens, and read George Orwell's '1984', I never, for a moment, imagined that I would ever live in a town overrun with the sort of camera surveillance that Mr.Orwell describes in his book. Obviously, I was naive about the machinations of people in power, who are so fixated on accumulating money, and exerting control over the lives of others. The requirement to go to school five days a week, and to do homework, was more than bad enough for me to have to deal with. How could I have then known that, one day, in the not very distant future, CCTV cameras would be filming us, in London, almost continuously, wherever we go.

I think we can take it as virtually beyond doubt that the logical extension of the current heinous situation, will be cameras set up within our own homes, filming us at all times - inside, as well as outside.

The only way that this seemingly inevitable drift into complete surveillance-control of the human population, by the fanatical extremists in power, could be averted, is through a major revolution of understanding and action by "the masses". Currently, however, most human beings show little sign of being anything other than complacently accepting of the surveillance status quo, which treats them with no more respect than a greedy, materialistic land-owner would be likely to treat a herd of cattle, held captive in his possession.