Three Items
Saturday, October 11, 2008
1) The closest thing we have in America to real satanism is hard-core christianity. Now, being that satanism is simply a type of hard-core christianity, this may be so self-evident as to be not worth mentioning.
But of course, I'm thinking specifically of Sarah Palin. Anyone in her position, who was not an absolute hedon, and who was capable of the remotest self-assessment, would have flat turned down her recent "opportunity." Alistair Crowley and Jimmy Page wrapped together had nothing so obscene to show the world as Sarah Palin's ophidian mind.
2) My own hedonism extends to having recently gathered together all my stray electronics, sold them, and received in turn an brand new XBox 360 with a wireless controller and a 60 gigabyte hard drive. Look, I'm not running for Vice President, here. Plus, it barely cost me anything. Besides (suddenly I feel defensive) I consider the novel and all its attendant self-justifications a far sight more decadent than any video game. It's as if someone spent all the time they could have in gainful employment doodling around with the singular, lonesome pleasures of typeset printing. The novel is dead, people.
That said, I find the games confusing. They're so filled with visual data I can't tell what I'm supposed to be doing. Grand Theft Auto IV is practically just an undulating field of brown, with voice acting. My eyes start bulging with strain just thinking about it. The upshot is that my chief pleasure on this machine is a cheap little throwback called Geometry Wars Evolved the Second, or something, which is basically just shooting at or avoiding blobs and dots of varying degrees of malevolence, very clearly delimited.
3) I know those best suited to understanding the economic collapse are doing their best to move the consequences of it onto me, and that the result could, for me, lead to every discomfort up to and including death. I worry, too, for the relatively modest retirement funds and holdings of my parents. Yet watching it unfold in real time, possessing as I do nothing of value (aside from an Xbox) I feel joy in my heart, real cosmic joy, at the horror and panic of those most effected by what, after the last eight years, cannot remotely be called a tragedy. I like watching these un-American jerkoffs run, though they seem to be running straight for me.
posted by Greg Purcell @ 1:56 PM,
