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anti-press ezine 2000 11 19
ANTI-PRESS EZINE #18
"We're Positive About The Negative"
A November E-dition
(C) Copyright 2000 Anti-Press All Rights Reserved
***THIS E-DITION: Anti-Press on Huntin', Bankin' & Bloviatin' PLUS Viki
Reed Chills Out With Cold Readin'.***
NOTE: NENYland is pronounced nee-nee-land.
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GET OUT YOUR BULLETPROOF VEST--
IT'S SHOOTIN' SEASON
By Anti-Press
It's that time of year. Shootin' season.
This season is much more than hunting season. There's something about
this time of year here in NENYland-- northeastern New York State-- that
brings out the guns, bad judgment and psychotic episodes. Must be the
slide into winter, the long dark nights and usually overcast days
cloaked in morbid gray, all of it aggravated by the growing
bone-chilling cold in the autumn air. Does something to some folks'
brains.
Man flips out and takes his girlfriend/wife hostage in their home
(typically a trailer). Stand-off with the cops. Bang. Bang. One
bullet for his female victim, the other for himself. Or, fortunately,
no one is taken hostage, it's just a madman confronting the cops.
"You'll have to pry this gun from my cold, dead hands." OK. The cops
are willing to go along. Bang. Bang.
And then you throw in hunting season, an activity that is regulated with
licenses and safety classes and game wardens, whatever. Even though a
hunter is supposed to be properly trained in the use of his rifle,
somehow another human being becomes a target, near misses and
not-so-near misses (i.e. bulls-eye!). Woman taking a shower in the
privacy of her home and-- zip-- a bullet goes ripping thru the bathroom.
Stray bullets from a deer rifle can travel up to three miles.
Or two guys are out hunting, they separate to increase their chances of
getting game, but in actuality they're increasing the chances of one
screwing over the other. A movement. A shape. Must be a deer. Bang!
Got that big buck! But on closer inspection it turns out the buck is
really is your buddy. Former buddy, that is.
But don't these nimrods take hunter-safety courses, especially with the
emphasis on how to recognize a deer from a man? You know, THINK before
your shoot. Well, there was another tragic huntin' incident reported in
the Local (news)Paper and we found out the criteria used to determine
the nature of a target. From what is quoted, statements from the county
coroner, color doesn't matter. Ergo, blaze orange vests or caps won't
make a difference; you might as well wear camouflage. If you think you
have spotted a buck deer, to take a shot at it legally you have to see
antlers three inches or longer. Of course, no human looks like a deer
with antlers.
That's it? That's the main criteria?
So for Halloween little Johnny decides to dress up as Rudolph the
Red-Nosed Reindeer. He's walking down a country road after school to
show his costume to his aunt next door. Meanwhile, Buck Nimrod is about
a half-a-mile away, ensconced on a tree-covered hillside, relaxing after
finishing off his six-pack of malt liquor. His vision is a little fuzzy
but what the hey, he shoots better this way.
Buck takes a look through his telescopic sight. Jeezum Crow! Look at
the antlers on that one! That bouncin' red nose makes it an easy
target...
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FROM THE PRECISION REALITY CENTER:
WHAT INTEREST DOES GOD HAVE WITH YOU?
By Anti-Press
The obituary notice states the recently-deceased was on loan to his
friends and relatives from god and he has returned to the arms of the
Big Guy in the Sky.
If people want to deal with grief this way, fine. But we have the right
to question why most people handle reality with blind faith in
supernatural illogic. How does a perfect god create such an imperfect
world? Why does he play favorites? Why does a good person die in the
prime of life while an evil one lives happily to a ripe old age?
Wait a minute-- on loan? Prime? Of course-- god is a banker. And we
all know what bankers are like. No more misunderstandings about god's
interest in-- or with-- us.
That explains the collection plate being passed around at church. You
have to tithe. Don't tithe and your lack of interest (payments) might
result in sudden repossession. Don't forget the prime rate-- tithing--
is ten per cent of your take.
Now all those sanctimonious televangalists and their begging for money--
maybe they've stumbled upon the truth with such concepts as "spiritual
bankruptcy". And if god controls everything, then he's the ultimate
banker who runs-- and rigs-- every game in town. Free market, free
will-- forget it! He'll let you win the lottery of life for a while and
on a whim he'll decide when you cash in your chips.
Don't like the rigged game? Some people try to frustrate god by
freezing their assets, i.e. using cryonics to preserve their bodies
until future science can bring them back to life. Others look for a
better deal with the Loan Shark Down Below but they get caught up with
the devil in the details. (And then you'll have to suffer god's eternal
punnishment which is worse than this essay.)
Here at the Precision Reality Center we propose a new church, a true
church, the Other-World Bank of the $upreme One. The purpose of this
church will be to rake in the money through indulgences. The highest
attainment will be for a follower to be $ouled out. Any sin can be
forgiven with enough cash in the collection plate.
On second thought, forget it. Who would be stupid enough to think that
donating material wealth will guarantee entrance to immaterial heaven?
That could never happen, especially with a just god.
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DINOSAURS STILL LUMBERING AROUND NENYLAND
By Anti-Press
According to the buzz, the Local (news)Paper apparently ain't doing too
well despite its virtual monopoly. It has lost a couple of big
advertisers and like most newspapers around the country it's losing
readers to TeeVee and the Internet. Hey, it's probably losing readers
to bathroom walls. After all, graffiti has less typos and is more
accurate.
Apparently to create some interest in its fishwrap format the Paper has
been featuring two local personalities debating issues of the day from
their respective political POVs, i.e. one on the left, one on the right.
In the past each columnist has submitted letters to the Paper that have
been printed to fill space, taking up the slack from less advertising.
Like an ad each columnist is trying to sell something, in this case the
validity of his viewpoint. Instead of proselytizing they're just
bloviating to the converted. We skip over the leftist's side of the
debate because he's too conservative for us.
As for the right-winger-- well, fossilized philosophy can be amusing at
times. He has a Ph.D. but apparently that degree was awarded by John
Birch U. Of course, Mr. Right is always whining about conservative
causes, especially as an advocate of the unborn (as if the unborn have
any say in their representation).
The latest Left-Right debate was in regards to ERA, the Equal Rights
Amendment. According to Mr. Right god has a basic blueprint for men and
women-- you know, the man stays out late, whores around and gets drunk
while the faithful wifey waits at home, barefoot and pregnant in the
kitchen, reading her King James. As long as the man cleans himself up
for Sunday services, promising to lead a better life, he can fug off the
other six days of the week. This "blueprint" is healthy, good for
America.
OK, Mr. Right didn't say it that way. We have a tendency to go off on
wild tangents. Then again, so does Mr. Right. As Rod Serling used to
say, for your consideration... here's an excerpt from Mr. Right's
comments on equality between men and women:
"ERA in full bloom guts the military capacity for a variety of reasons.
Attempting to make eunuchs of combat personnel is expensive.
Psychological neutering and spaying of soldiers and sailors will not
provide the most-efficient combat personnel. The military has no second
chance to make a first strike."
Huh?-- the great U.S. of A. would strike first? We thought this nation
was the Good Guy; we only strike when someone else attacks first. This
reminds us of those crazy hawks decades ago who thought the only way to
end the Cold War was to launch our nukes first and wipe out the evil
Commies before they could get us. As for so-called psychological
neutering and spaying-- hey, Mr. Right, we think you're suffering from
intellectual erectile dysfunction!
Here's another enlightening excerpt:
"God initiated freedom of choice. Choose rightly and be rewarded.
Choose wrongly and be punished. Male and female he made us. Change for
change's sake is hazardous."
God also made dinosaurs. And despite what your Xtian leaders say,
dinosaurs were not on Noah's Ark-- mainly because the Ark is a fairy
tale. It's wasn't a Great Flood that killed off the thunder lizards; it
was an environmental shift, probably caused by the impact of a giant
climate-altering meteor. The hazard for the dinosaurs was the fact they
couldn't change, they couldn't adapt to a new environment.
Just like you, Mr. Right.
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CROSSING FINGERS OVER BEHIND YOUR BACK
By Viki Reed
Life's a bitch, then you die; unless you're dead and make an appearance
on "Crossing Over With John Edward" (Sci-Fi Channel). John Edward is a
ballroom-dance fanatic from New York who claims to have been
communicating with the dead since he was a kid. This youthful, hunky
metaphysical Dononhue brings The Dead to television every weeknight for
a half-an-hour, practicing what was exposed as pure fraud by Harry
Houdini himself almost a hundred years ago.
Gone are the days of crystal balls, cheesecloth ectoplasm and
table-rapping; but the scam called cold-reading' proved subtle enough
to revive. It's a con/profession chiefly commercialized by celebrity
mediums like John Edward, Sylvia Browne, James Van Praagh, and George
Anderson. Cold-reading is a skill that combines people-watching,
emotional stalking, disorientation, and acting. A "medium" scopes out
everything that their five senses can discern. They furiously process
all information availableand make calculated guesses presented as
observations, beginning broad and refining as confirmations or negations
are freely offered by the subject.
Charging desperate people hundreds of dollars to connect with their
loved ones at venues like "The Learning Annex" shouldn't be the path of
a devout clairvoyant. But demand overwhelmed their generous spirits.
Unable to cater to the thousands of requests for personal readings
(which cost considerably more than a seminar), they started appearing
on television (usually promoting books and courses) as guests of
indescribably idiotic daytime hosts, who promoted them by validating
these perverse grief-games with inappropriate displays of mawkish
reverence and baseless confirmation.
There are a number of earthly problems with Edward and his
contemporaries: none have succeeded in performing under real tests of
scientific scrutiny despite the Sci-Fi Channel's claim that Edwards
couldn't be stumped by a major university study Problematically the
testing they refer to was not scientifically conducted nor sponsored by
the university that housed it. The psychics' were deprived of sight,
only one-fifth of the tools needed to perform cold-reading.
Glancing at "Crossing Over" it's blatantly obvious that his subjects
repeatedly make the fatal mistake of giving more information than asked
for, resulting in Edward's appearing to know things he couldn't
possibly know'. A tally of misfires goes unmeasured because he moves so
fast, with such charm that subject and viewer alike can't possibly keep
track in real time. Gallery members are so busy rolling over into
temptation that they don't ask the obvious questions, like why can the
dead cross-over from beyond' but can only do so through a misfit
handful of otherwise unsuccessful people? Why The Dead-who again have
the ability to transcend indefinable realms-communicate only in symbols
and vagaries-unable to even state their own full names? Why a medium
has to ask any questions at all if they indeed are in direct contact
with The Dead?
More than smoke and mirrors, it's smoke and flaming mirrors.
"Crossing Over" is presented by The Science-Fi (Fiction) Channel,
whichshrewdly covers its behind on-air and at its website, by asking
viewers to decide for themselves if Edward is for real. Unbeknownst to
Edward's fans and gallery members, the prominent modern debunker James
Randi (as in The Amazing-the devout atheist-Uri Geller's greatest enemy-
Randi) has issued a Million Dollar Challenge for over twenty years
through his Scientific Research Foundation. No psychic or medium has
ever claimed the prize, few have even taken the challenge. Those who
went for the million, like Sylvia Browne, failed pathetically when
prevented from using cold-reading techniques.
Why is "Crossing Over" all that bad? Yes. For the same reason that
when a child is abducted in a small town, no one can sleep with their
doors unlocked again. Or when a single stranded motorist is attacked by
a "good Samaritan", who can safely accept help again? When you poison
the already depleted well of human trust, you taint it for all. These
fakes tell you with a straight face, that here, in front of this TV
camera, in this studio setting, they are talking to someone's dead
mother, father, brother, baby, or college buddy. According to Edward and
company, The Dead are together in blissful spiritual plane of existence.
Even though your dearly departed can talk to you, they can only do it
through these total strangers.
"Don't feel badly for me!" The Dead reassure us. "We're happy, free of
illness and injury, with long-dead pets. We're with you always. That
time you thought you felt my presence, you were right, I was there." No
mention of hell and its occupants unless you cut to the tragic Gallery
members, falling apart in piles of lost memories and profound ache.
At the end of every show, Edward gingerly reminds us to tell the people
in our lives that we love them-- now, before it's too late, thank you
and good night.
How much love is created by someone who takes grief and turns it into
zeros on a contract? What good is had from preventing people from
honestly grieving and moving on? Isn't giving the living the an
illusion of spiritual completion the same as excusing personal
responsibility in the present? Like, "It's okay that I cheated on my
wife now, because I can acknowledge it when I'm dead!"
Why don't The Dead tell Edwards important things, like: the secrets of
life and death; what God looks like; or how to definitively communicate
at any time with the dead, if not see them, too? Edgar Cayce was
alleged to have received thousands of medical cures and homeopathic
remedies while in a meditative state. Edward seems only to have
conjured up an agent and a syndication deal.
I have some questions for John Edward and company: have The Dead given
you an approximate date as to when you'll be exposed and what foreign
country they're suggesting you should fly to?
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