Hey Look! An Unpopular War!

[Tequila Zaire]

Politics aside here anyone else starting to see clear signs of people around the world capitalizing on the current conflict in Iraq AKA: Vietnam 2.0 in assorted media outlets, political camps, organizations, groups, religions, cults, saturday afternoon knitting societies?

One of the hassles of Vietnam was that everyone had a story about how bad the war was....because well...it was. However when you have 900 stories a day like that...from everywhere...you gotta wonder how many are using the same info, retooling it to sound grimmer than the last person, or simply using the entire situation as an opportunity to present their own ideals and use it to their own advantage.

It's kinda like telling a girl you want to fuck who loves animals and animal rights that you are a member of PETA to earn brownie points.

You're starting to see that in many areas both from the left and right. Country singers doing "patriotic albums of good ole American ideals" and "Neo Hippy Folk Political Tunes" from the other music spectrums. The Hippy generation has oddly been the most opportunistic since it lets them reafirm the lifestyles and ideals of their youth that layed dormant for 20 odd years. The danger in this is that when you lose that sense of wisdom and calm...you end up with a massive mobs of dangerous fundementalists...and when you have fundementalists on both sides of the spectrum...be it well armed with words or guns...all of us in the middle are kinda fucked. Our Mass media has taken up sides...our politicians ARE the sides...and anyone with an ounce of celebrity does their best to grab their fans or lend their name to their cause. Some do it with honest care...others as stated above...do it for yet more limelight.

Lets face it...this war has been great for MANY careers and a cynical as that may sound it's spreading fast with every journalist, writer, musician, celebrity, commentator, priest, boyscout, neo-jesus, and terrorrist trying to cash in on the action...

Look at the 3 Billion (ok maybe only a few dozen) Michael Moore wannabe's that've popped up with movies so blatently ripping off his style it's pathetic ...not that it matter cause in that kinda filmmaking volume matters...or the anti-michael moore films. How sad is that? Films speciifically made to trash one another.

The Bestseller list is no better...when the top sellers are books written by hardliners like Moore, Coulter, and even a personal fave O'Reilly...one does have to fear for this nation and the world really. If stuff liek that is not blatent profiteering...then what is? Using ones age for personal gain is nothing new...but in this age it's been taken to all new levels. Now anyone can get in on the action...and touring the net...few are holding back.

[Nightingale]

Jumping on the bandwagon has always been there, and always will be. The difference now is that we can see it for what it is; previously, as communications weren't so fast, such stunts worked. Think of it as a fashion movement; one little girl wears ankle socks and they look damn good. Next day a second little girl wears ankle socks and they still look damn good. Within a month every thin and fat little schoolgirl is wearing ankle socks and they look damned.