hott air
Jessica Simpson. Britney Spears. Paris Hilton. What do all these nincampoops have in common? Yep, you guessed it. They are all airheads with money. Wealth that came from the adulation of the masses, corporate dollars and oh my god, like totally, from a best-selling autobiography in Paris Hilton’s case.
How is it that most people nowadays haven’t read a word of Tolstoy or Shakespeare and the response you get is ‘So? whatever’. I would have been more understanding if this came from a 14-year old but not from a 32-year old PR executive (or maybe that explains it).
There was a great article last Saturday from Shelley Gare, a journalist who is working on a book about the rise of airheadism. I’m not so sure the joke’s on them. If society is bankrolling the rise and rise of these idiots (who, apparently, I can’t call idiots because, like, whateva!), then the joke is on us. The piece mentioned that there are less and less University students majoring in Chemistry or Physics. Fo' shame.
Quoted in Gare’s article was this section from Ray Bradbury’s 1953 classic Fahrenheit 451:
You must understand that our civilization is so vast that we can’t have our minorities upset and stirred…People want to be happy, isn’t that right? Haven’t you heard it all your life? I want to be happy, people say. Well, aren’t they? Don’t we keep them moving, don’t we give them fun? That’s all we live for, isn’t it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these.
Special mention to some of my scientist friends who are never truly recognized nor duly rewarded for their work. :P Ty*, a senior microbiologist who once worked at the Garvan Institute of Breast Cancer Research, to R*, one of the resident animal biologists at Taronga Zoo, to D*, a biochemist whose sole job is to do research and come up with new chemical structures, such as a new type of flour and finally to C* (who reads this LJ although his lazy ass never bothers to comment), who is currently assisting a professor at UCLA working on enzymes and that oh-so-crucial work on zinc fingers (did I get that right? :P).
How is it that most people nowadays haven’t read a word of Tolstoy or Shakespeare and the response you get is ‘So? whatever’. I would have been more understanding if this came from a 14-year old but not from a 32-year old PR executive (or maybe that explains it).
There was a great article last Saturday from Shelley Gare, a journalist who is working on a book about the rise of airheadism. I’m not so sure the joke’s on them. If society is bankrolling the rise and rise of these idiots (who, apparently, I can’t call idiots because, like, whateva!), then the joke is on us. The piece mentioned that there are less and less University students majoring in Chemistry or Physics. Fo' shame.
Quoted in Gare’s article was this section from Ray Bradbury’s 1953 classic Fahrenheit 451:
You must understand that our civilization is so vast that we can’t have our minorities upset and stirred…People want to be happy, isn’t that right? Haven’t you heard it all your life? I want to be happy, people say. Well, aren’t they? Don’t we keep them moving, don’t we give them fun? That’s all we live for, isn’t it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these.
Special mention to some of my scientist friends who are never truly recognized nor duly rewarded for their work. :P Ty*, a senior microbiologist who once worked at the Garvan Institute of Breast Cancer Research, to R*, one of the resident animal biologists at Taronga Zoo, to D*, a biochemist whose sole job is to do research and come up with new chemical structures, such as a new type of flour and finally to C* (who reads this LJ although his lazy ass never bothers to comment), who is currently assisting a professor at UCLA working on enzymes and that oh-so-crucial work on zinc fingers (did I get that right? :P).