Thursday, October 04, 2007

Bullshit.

It is funny how the whole world is caught up in this 'Harry Potter' business.
I remember meeting a guy who asked me "Hey, you read aa ? : deathly hallows "
I was perplexed, because for one thing I did not know what 'The deathly hallows' was and secondly because I did not know whether the dude had asked me a question or had told me a sentence, complete per se.
I asked him what he meant, and was given the following explanation: " Arre, the new Harry Potter book yaar"

Where do these clowns learn to speak English ?
I know 5 Indian languages, you could speak to me in one of those, why do you have to butcher the English language ?

When I say this out loud, they usually say "oh, so if you are such a 'big' American why don't you leave this country and go to America" and this... from a guy who is usually wearing a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, eats at KFC\Subway, listens to the latest Hip-Hop (which I can't stand) as that is what is shown on TV these days, speaks English albeit with an accent, dreams of getting into an MBA, which is essentially an American qualification...
You get the picture.

But, He doesn't know the difference between 'to' and 'too' or 'your' and 'you're' or even 'of' and 'off'
I give up.

So back to my point, when I say "no, I do not read Harry Potter" they usually have this incredulous expression on their face, as though I am the intellectual equivalent of a village bumpkin, chewing straw and with a rake\pitchfork and all. Similar to how I feel when someone says that Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code is such a "Great !" book. And I wonder why no one has even heard of Foucalt's pendulum. Can't these people discover books on their own ? Do they have to rely on the media, to decide for them what to read ? Its almost as if not reading HP or The Da Vinci code, means not being 'hip' or 'cool' or whatever it is people like to call it.

Oh: Right, Right, human beings are stupid. Look at most of the explanations people had, for things, before the 40's. Absurd!
Or look at how in this supposed 'modern' age people still believe in organized religion.

I would like to summarize this with a joke that George Carlin once said:

In the bullshit department, we have to stand in awe of religion. Which actually has some of us believing: That there is an invisible man up there, in the sky. Who watches everything you do. Who has made hell, for people who don't listen to him. Where you will burn for the rest of eternity. But, He loves you! And though he is all powerful, all seeing, omnipotent, omnipresent all perfect etc etc... He still needs your money, because he just can't handle: money. Talk about a good bullshit story: Ho-ly Shit.
- George Carlin (You are all diseased [1999])


Ha ha gets me every time I hear it.

Here is a snap I took. Just thought should put this up. I like the chiaroscuro effect .

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

tht anon was me in gandhi's post

-ravi

call sometime or give ur no.

nice post

JerryKantrell said...

Thanks man Ravi,

I will call you up.

Varun said...

crap, what a big let down.

JerryKantrell said...

XD