Yesterday is Today and Today is To-Murrow
Any time someone steps out of sync with the line, colors into the unknown, commonly referred to as "outside the lines" or deviates from the norm or standard, that person becomes a target. It has always been the same. Some pay with their lives, some manage to make a mark and continue on but all are initially seen as troublemakers, crazy, freaks, or any other discrediting label that can be slapped on a person brave enough to stand up. Rosa Parks, Stephen Biko, Cindy Sheehan, Edward Murrow, Caesar Chavez, Ingrid Newkirk, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X. There really are thousands upon thousands of people who are nameless to the rest of us, but to those who have suffered oppression, terror, injustice, there is always a slew of names that are offered as people who made a difference.
I saw "Goodnight and Good Luck" last night. Not the smash'em, crash'em, kill'em kind of movie that is abundant as of late, but a deeply stirring film. It is so difficult to watch as things happen when you know, inherently, that it is wrong. At one point, one of the staff members (Robert Downey Jr.) says "what if we're wrong?" what if we are defending the wrong side? It is easy to dismiss that statement now, but in context, when everyone was literally petrified that communism would take over, it was a deeply serious concern. What if they were, as accused, aiding the enemy?
Everything about that film reminded me of today. As I am sure was the point. People being held without charge. People being interrogated, lives ruined. Institutions like the ACLU were mocked and ridiculed as soviet fronts. Over and over again, heresay was stated as fact and charges were sealed. The beauty of what Murrow et al did was using McCarthy's words against him. It's one thing to fight what other's say, it is impossible to fight what comes out of your own mouth and is demonstrated by your own actions. To confront the senator meant taking on the corporate backers and advertisers as well.
Today, I know the tide is turning. I can feel it. It gives me hope. And I wonder if there could possibly be a Murrow today with so many news outlets, and so much information floating around. I think that the standard news outlets now are so restricted by the binds of the corporate overlords that it would take a monumentally heroic action to break away and speak truth. And that is all I want. I don't want inflated allegations or exploitive innuendos. I want fact. I am tired of seeing people who know that there is a record of them saying one thing, turning around and saying they never it.
We are constantly being distracted with the town cryer's message of the day - "Christmas Under Attack!" "Don't Say Merry Christmas - you'll get shot" "Bird Flu!" "Home Invasions" "Your Kids are doing Drugs!" arrrrrrggggghhh! Don't come out! Stay inside! Keep your doors locked and blinds down! Keep your tv tuned to us, we won't let anything happen to you as long as you stay glued to us and our very important, life saving information. Do not under any circumstances fall back on such unstable and untested intrinsics such as common sense or intuition. Gads! No! Whatever you do don't do that!
Fear is the name of the game now. Fear of losing your traditions, terrorists, black people, hispanic people, animals, muslims, middle easterners, pakistanis, birds, germs, noxious gases, bugs, insects, your bed, your toothbrush, golly, just about everything carries some kind of horrible threat to your very existence. It's hard just going to the grocery store now. I need to be tethered to some news outlet so that I can check to make sure my brand of lettuce isn't covered in feces, or some other horrible possibility. Whatever did we do before 24 hour news and the internet? Gosh, can you imagine how uninformed we would be?
Anyway, go see the movie. And allow yourself to go back in time to about, oh, say, 20 minutes ago when someone was accusing someone else of something and screaming "threat!" every two seconds. It's really quite captivating.