Addictive Thinking

Sometimes when I walk to work or when I'm by myself, I rehearse conversations with various sorts of belief-addicts. Lately, I fantasize being on a Politically-Incorrect-type talkshow where there are a couple of entertainers and an "addictainer"--someone whose beliefs are so loopy that it's tacitly understood there's some brain-chemistry change that's happened. I imagine myself being spindled by the addictainer in his or her projection of self-hatred, as the one who's "the problem." And because I'm gay, because I have a spirituality that's more earth-centered, because I find my soul with others instead of in some individualized and nationalized spot somewhere in the vicinity of my aorta, I'm the easiest target.

The thing I notice about addictive thinking is how nicely it dovetails with soundbite-sized pieces. An addictainer can spin a political ad-copy-writer into right-wing "enthusigasms" all right! (I'm sure the same thing happens with left-wingers as well, but we have to wait to see that develop in the corporatist (as defined by Mussolini) USA.) And I would actually see my goal in such a situation as to provide "bad television" because the medium itself is in the clutches of addictainment and I wish to continue on in my recovery.

(Sidebar: I wonder what Robert Downey Jr. is doing these days, and I hope that he's seeking a way out of the entertainment industry. It seems designed to continue the addictions in both its practitioners and the general populace, and if he's serious about his recovery, he'd find another line of work that agreed with him and his inner four-year-old.)

Television: Our best thinking got us here, didn't it? Pointless shouting matches with no redeeming value other than getting caught up in a political version of WWF-Smackdown? I can't bring myself to watch TV much anymore. I caught a bit of the Oscars and before that I caught a smattering when I took a vacation up in Albany, New York and stayed at the Ramada Inn. Even there I only watched it to catch what was going on locally. I caught snippets of Chicken-Noodle-News but it's so inane and sterile, it's like eating a box of twinkies.

I know it's an effective medium and all--for those people who don't or can't get their news from Internet sources, it provides a devastatingly all-encompassing blanket. I know there are a lot of lazy-ass people out there who have no desire to form their own opinions, who freely lease out their head-space to all manner of authority figures only too willing to speak in their favor even as they act only in their own self-interest. Part of me wonders though if television might not be rescued from the addictainers.

A couple of months ago I had this feeling that the nation had reached the tipping point, that enough people had finally developed an awareness about where we're headed. The major question is whether or not there are enough people to take action and lead us forward into a greener, more vibrant and abundant future, or whether too many people are still inside their fear as yet, to take any action on their own and others' behalf. In the lives of many addicts comes a moment of grace, where the opportunity of surrender presents itself. Please Gaia, let there be enough people who have hit their political/economic/spiritual bottom to understand they have to start with their own sense of powerlessness to get anywhere.

For that is the ultimate power of the addictainers, that they appeal to the addictainment-consumers' helplessness and fantasies of power-over-others. Ultimately it keeps people stuck, which is ostensibly where the addictainers and their corporatist allies are most comfortable keeping the rest of humanity. People are waking up, but the next question is this: Will you get out of bed now?