As IF Times

Source: Enough votes to remove Confederate flag, survey shows

I blame Oprah.  Who knew that our dysfunctional society was chock full of offensive and insensitive symbols representing oppression of virtually every subset of society? The confederate ‘stars and bars’ flag is claimed to be a symbol of  slavery and oppression from a long bygone era and as such should be eliminated from public display.  Hmm.  In Oklahoma, a monument inscribed with the Ten Commandments is also targeted for removal because of its religious symbolism and therefore offensive to some.  For those not familiar with the Ten Commandments, they describe some of the most basic rules about living in a society; practical things such as not killing others, not stealing etc., perfectly reasonable (to most) and not the exclusive purview of those with religious leanings.

We recall the manufactured outrage over the Washington Redskins name last year when apparently people could barely live with that offensive label.  Somehow they have.  The Outraged and Offended racket (O and O racket) is coming into full bloom with the aid of sensationalist and ratings hungry media and of course the usual endless cast of litigating lizards.

Virtually everything we can think of these days is a Rorshach test of sensibilities, like people seeing evil messages in a bowl of alpha-bits. One can easily interpret the Apple logo as one which represents evil and sin as in the bite taken from the apple in the garden of Eden.  Years ago, the stars and moon in the logo for Proctor and Gamble was interpreted as symbolism for witchcraft and paganism.  What about Underwood devilled ham with the red guy and the pitchfork on the can?

It’s so easy to be offended by something these days that if you can’t find something that offends you, you’re not trying hard enough.  What is most interesting is the bullying aspect of those who are offended by a given issue.  That is, if you don’t agree with their views, you must be a hater.  What if you really don’t care?  Why isn’t that option B? So if you don’t really care about gay marriage, you’re a homophobe.  If you don’t recycle, you’re a polluter.  If you don’t eat organic chickens, you are contributing to cruelty.  If you don’t buy fair trade coffee, you are contributing to oppression in other countries.  Somehow, the self righteous  who universally have IPhones don’t seem too concerned about the sweatshop conditions that exist in the countries that manufacture them.  Or the designer clothes that they wear.

Of course, some people have legitimate claims to be offended.  For example, the husband of Joyce Mitchell, the woman who helped the two inmates escape from a New York prison has every right to be offended since he was actually targeted to be killed in the original escape plan. But, even he forgives his wife.

Unless you happen to be a basket of kittens, you are going to offend somebody and something is going to offend you.  Suck it up. You could be living in the African sub Sahara where you can be offended by a lion trying to eat you.  Let’s be practical and  be offended about  things that really affect us; such as media stupidity and body odor.

link Scarlett Johansson Threatens to Sue Over Nude Photos – UsMagazine.com.

Of course, the FBI is all over this one.  Apparently dozens of agents have volunteered their own personal time to work on this case.  The amount of time spent poring over evidence will be astronomical.   Staff will be pulled off cases looking for terrorist bombers in order to solve this pressing case.  Removing nude pics from the Internet.  Good luck with that. 

Poor Scarlett is obviously aghast that someone would hack into her telephone and steal private photos of her.  Living as she does in fairyland, she was unaware that just recently, Congressman Anthony Weiner had also suffered the fate of having his tighty-whities displayed on the world’s biggest billboard.  Of course in Weiner’s case, he was targeting a specific audience. but unlike Scarlett, the only ones who may have been interested were probably gay men.

The philosophical issue is that pictures stolen from Scarlett’s phone are equivalent to having them stolen from a locked drawer in her house.  I suppose that makes sense in theory and we won’t argue with the principle.  But here is the essential seam which separates principled types from common sense types: theory is not reality.  I can bake a pie and place it on my window to cool, but if it’s on a busy street, certain unprincipled types are going to take my pie.  If I want to park my convertible on Chicago’s south side, it may not be a good idea to leave the Nikon in full display on the car seat.  

Celebrities who need exposure to further their careers are often the ones to bleat about privacy issues when they know that their lives are lived under a microscope.  At least Oprah and Joy Behar are smart enough not to take nude pics of themselves on their phones.  Imagine the audience for that.  Anyone who thinks cell phones are private are plain delusional.  If Wikileaks can hack into top military secrets, what makes anyone think their Verizon account is safe?   In real life, people regularly have things stolen from their cars, their homes, they may even have nude pics of themselves circulating without their consent, but those are the hazards of real life.  Years and years of indifferent applications of punishments for law breaking has resulted in expectations of a certain amount of criminal behavior in our society.  How many people these days don’t lock their car or house when they leave?  What does it say when years ago, in many cities, it was common to see “no radio” stickers on car windows?   Most petty crimes aren’t even prosecuted any more for the time and effort involved. 

Celebrities should not live under the delusion that they are immune from the vicissitudes of life that normal people deal with.  Celebrity status does not entirely insulate them from the society they choose to live in.  They only benefit is that they get to publicize their moral outrage.