Posts by DCBCauchi
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One example of the clean break with the past.
From where I'm sitting, those in the service of the Left and Right pay nothing more than hypocritical lip-service to the old slogans of Freedom, Equality, Progress and God, Country, Family. Instead, both openly worship Money, Power, Position, the means to Do What's Right.
Indeed, some footsoldiers of the Left are so confused nowadays that they think Freedom is a slogan for the Right!
Okay, enough. I'll stop now.
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While I'm on a slightly mad blithering roll, let me tell you what it is that distinguishes us from the cows in the field. It's not the ability to lie, to laugh, to use tools, or to cook food.
It's our ability to project our fantasies on to the stars and on to the world around us, to transform the world around us, through those fantasies, from something brute and mute.
To tell stories using visual symbols and music.
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OnPoint: Set it on fire, then, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
much like our culture it is mediated by devices
The Futurists (and others) wanted a clean break between Tradition and the Modern. They wanted to stop telling the old stories, the continuous pictorial tradition stretching back at least 50,000 years, and tell new stories with new pictorial means for the new people of the new society, mediated by the Machine. (They were big on initial capitals for abstract nouns back then.) The new free, self-determined people, slaves to neither god nor king.
Well, we've had our clean break. Pity it hasn't worked out like anyone planned it. Something filled the void that was left. Something that replaced the gods and kings.
Mediocre careerism and a desire for a comfortable life.
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OnPoint: Set it on fire, then, in reply to Islander,
These are all very good points, especially about mental illness.
What I have noted is how many ‘helping’ organisations actually have a self-interested motive.
Generalising off-topic wildly, I can't think of any organisation or institution that doesn't quickly lose sight of its original purpose and become a self-perpetuating gravy train.
Gautama Buddha (and, I suspect, Jesus) carefully told his followers just before he karked it, 'Whatever you do, don't make a bloody religion out of what I've been saying.'
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OnPoint: Set it on fire, then, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
Oh, sure, and you know how likely you were to survive amputation?
People routinely survived amputation. It was not a death sentence. No picnic either, but not necessarily a death sentence by any means.
My point was twofold: 1 Doctors could do more than stop bleeding. 2 Your quality of life, assuming no major infection or other unfortunate outcome from the treatment, depended on how much care in carrying out their job the doctor decided you're worth, assuming they'd see you at all (good luck if you're the town drunk who's just broken his leg).
How much of a stump they leave, how much skin, how the flaps are sewn together, whether you'll be able to walk with a wooden leg or not, how much screaming agony you're in, etc, etc. Assuming you survive the operation of course.
Late 19th/early 20th century medical advances have clearly made a huge difference, especially in terms of infection, the big killer. However, there was medicine before those advances. And how it was delivered could make all the difference.
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Look at how we treat the homeless.
Right here, right now, in our own backyard. You and me and everyone we know.
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In any age anywhere, if you're marginal, a 'drunken wastrel', not a 'contributing member of society', judgemental medical practitioners – not just medical practitioners, anyone 'official' – who think they know best, who don't even treat you as an individual human being with the right and responsibility to make your own decisions, will not treat you with the care and respect you deserve.
I think you should tell them clearly and firmly exactly where they can fuck off to.
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OnPoint: Set it on fire, then, in reply to DexterX,
We never left it! Speaking for myself at least.
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And drilling holes in people's skulls to relieve pressure on the brain is a very old medical treatment, a stone age technology used to treat our 40-year-old cave painter in fact.
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OnPoint: Set it on fire, then, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
It’s also worth remembering that before the twentieth century, medicine was essentially a gamble that killed as many as it cured. Once you got past stopping bleeding to death, you weren’t much better off with a doctor than without one.
And I dispute this as well. Doctors before the 20th century could do a lot more than stop bleeding. For example, they could remove a damaged limb before it develops gangrene and kills you. How they went about doing that, i.e. the degree of care and attention, would have a major effect on your subsequent quality of life, and capability. They could also treat your pain with drugs such as laudanum, if they chose to do so of course.