{"id":3424,"date":"2023-03-26T11:43:04","date_gmt":"2023-03-26T15:43:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/?p=3424"},"modified":"2023-03-26T14:33:02","modified_gmt":"2023-03-26T18:33:02","slug":"1976-vs-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/1976-vs-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"1976 vs 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ed: This piece is about fiction and non-fiction.\u00a0 It’s rather long (1812 words), but\u00a0 a snappy sort of read. Sincerest thanks to SAC.<\/strong> <\/em><\/p>\n

Sidney Aaron “Paddy” Chayefsky won three Academy Awards, making him the only three-time solo recipient of a screenwriting Oscar. The third was for Network,<\/em> a brutal satire about the Television Industry. Paddy’s Network<\/em> was ominously prescient, released in 1976\/77 at the onset of Jimmy Carter’s ruinous reign as POTUS. Carter was known for his Misery Index (interest rates as high as 20%, inflation at 13.5% and unemployment at 9%. Perhaps Chayefsky was a visionary, able to foresee repetitive folly. Even more dramatic — he unwittingly seemed to predict the infamous philosophy of Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum.<\/p>\n

It’s up to you to make the comparison between 1976 and 2023. The fictional Union Broadcasting System (UBS), struggling with poor ratings, decides to trot out its depressed news anchor who threatens to kill himself on the air. Instead he delivers a rant about life’s being “bullshit.”<\/p>\n

Howard Beale<\/strong>
\nI don’t have to tell you things
\nare bad. Everybody knows things
\nare bad. It’s a depression.
\nEverybody’s out of work or scared
\nof losing their job, the dollar
\nbuys a nickel’s worth, banks are
\ngoing bust, shopkeepers keep a
\ngun under the counter, punks
\nare running wild in the streets,
\nand there’s nobody anywhere who
\nseems to know what to do, and
\nthere’s no end to it. We know
\nthe air’s unfit to breathe and
\nour food is unfit to eat, and
\nwe sit and watch our TV’s
\nwhile some local newscaster
\ntells us today we had fifteen
\nhomicides and sixty-three
\nviolent crimes, as if that’s
\nthe way it’s supposed to be.
\nWe all know things are bad.
\nWorse than bad. They’re crazy.
\nIt’s like everything’s going
\ncrazy. So we don’t go out any
\nmore. We sit in the house, and
\nslowly the world we live in
\ngets smaller, and all we ask is
\nplease, at least leave us alone
\nin our own living rooms. . . and
\nI won’t say anything, just leave
\nus alone. Well, I’m not going to
\nleave you alone. I want you to
\nget mad — I don’t want you to riot.
\nI don’t want you to protest. I
\ndon’t want you to write your
\ncongressmen. Because I wouldn’t
\nknow what to tell you to write.
\nI don’t know what to do about the
\ndepression and the inflation and
\nthe defense budget and the Russians
\nand crime in the street. All
\nI know is first you got to get
\nmad. You’ve got to say: “I’m
\nmad as hell and I’m not going
\nto take this any more. I’m a
\nhuman being, goddammit. My life
\nhas value.” So I want you to
\nget up now. I want you to get
\nout of your chairs and go to
\nthe window. Right now. I want
\nyou to go to the window, open
\nit, and stick your head out
\nand yell. I want you to yell:
\n“I’m mad as hell and I’m not
\ngoing to take this any more!”<\/p>\n

The people ate it up. Ratings soared. Beale’s second rant was fueled by the death of his boss. He decides to expose Television as a Godless liar. It’s up to you to make the comparison between UBS in 1976 and NBC, CNN, ABC and CBS in 2023.<\/p>\n

Howard Beale<\/strong>
\nEdward George Ruddy died today!
\nEdward George Ruddy was the Chairman
\nof the Board of the Union Broad-
\ncasting Systems — and woe is us
\nif it ever falls in the hands of
\nthe wrong people. And that’s why
\nwoe is us that Edward George Ruddy
\ndied. Because this network is now
\nin the hands of CC and A the
\nCommunications Corporation of
\nAmerica. We’ve got a new Chairman
\nof the Board, a man named Frank
\nHackett now sitting in Mr. Ruddy’s
\noffice on the twentieth floor. And
\nwhen the twelfth largest company in
\nthe world controls the most awesome
\ngoddamned propaganda force in the
\nwhole godless world, who knows what
\nshit will be peddled for truth on
\nthis tube? So, listen to me!
\nTelevision is not the truth! Tele-
\nvision is a goddamned amusement
\npark, that’s what television is!
\nTelevision is a circus, a carnival,
\na traveling troupe of acrobats and
\nstory-tellers, singers and dancers,
\njugglers, side-show freaks, lion-
\ntamers and football players. We’re
\nin the boredom-killing business!
\nIf you want truth, go to God, go
\nto your guru, go to yourself because
\nthat’s the only place you’ll ever
\nfind any real truth! But, man,
\nyou’re never going to get any truth
\nfrom us. We’ll tell you anything
\nyou want to hear. We lie like hell!
\n. . . We’ll tell you any shit
\nyou want to hear! We deal in illusion
\nNone of it’s true! But you people sit
\nthere — all of you — day after day,
\nnight after night, all ages, colors,
\ncreeds — we’re all you know. You’re
\nbeginning to believe this illusion
\nwe’re spinning here. You’re be-
\nginning to think the tube is reality
\nand your own lives are unreal. You
\ndo whatever the tube tells you. You
\ndress like the tube, you eat like
\nthe tube, you raise your children
\nlike the tube, you think like the
\ntube. This is mass madness, you
\nmaniacs! In God’s name, you people
\nare the real thing! We’re the illu-
\nsions. So turn off this goddam
\nset! Turn it off right now! Turn
\nit off and leave it off. Turn it
\noff right now, right in the middle
\nof this very sentence I’m speaking
\n. . . . . .<\/p>\n

The people ate it up. Then Beale delivers a rant about a giant media corporation acquiring USB for something called the Saudi-Arabian Investment Corporation. Detailing how much of America is already owned by the Arabs. he condemns corporate America for selling out the people. Then, USB Chairman Arthur Jensen calls Beale for a little face to face chat. It’s up to you to make the comparison between 1976 Saudi Arabia and 2023 China; then between Jensen’s lecture and the 21st Century New World Order.<\/p>\n

Jensen<\/strong>
\nYou have meddled with the primal
\nforces of nature, Mr. Beale . . .
\nYou are an old man who thinks in
\nterms of nations and peoples. There
\nare no nations! There are no peoples!
\nThere are no Russians. There are no
\nArabs! There are no third worlds!
\nThere is no West! There is only one
\nholistic system of systems, one vast
\nand interwoven, interacting,
\nmulti-variate, multi-national
\ndominion of dollars! . . . petro-
\ndollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars!,
\nReichmarks, rubles, rin, pounds and
\nshekels! It is the international
\nsystem of currency that determines
\nthe totality of life on this planet.
\nThat is the natural order of things
\ntoday! That is the atomic,
\nsubatomic and galactic structure of
\nthings today. And you have meddled
\nwith the primal forces of nature,
\nand you will atone!
\nYou . . . howl about America and
\ndemocracy. There is no America.
\nThere is no democracy.
\nThere is only IBM and ITT and A T
\nand T . . . and Exxon. These are
\nthe nations of the world today. . . .
\nWe no longer live in a world of nations
\nand ideologies, Mr. Beale. The
\nworld is a college of corporations,
\ninexorably determined by the
\nimmutable by-laws of business. The
\nworld is a business, Mr. Beale! It
\nhas been since man crawled out of
\nthe slime, and our children, Mr.
\nBeale, will live to see that perfect<\/em>
\nworld in which there is no war and<\/em>
\nfamine, oppression and brutality —<\/em>
\none vast and ecumenical holding<\/em>
\ncompany, for whom all men will work<\/em>
\nto serve a common profit, in which<\/em>
\nall men will hold a share of stock,<\/em>
\nall necessities provided, all<\/em>
\nanxieties tranquilized, all boredom<\/em>
\namused.<\/em> And I have chosen you to
\npreach this evangel, Mr. Beale.<\/p>\n

Beale abandons his previous thinking and preaches the new world message. It’s up to you to decide if this fictitious summary has any resemblance or relevance to the world you live in.<\/p>\n

Beale<\/strong>
\nLast night, I got up here and asked
\nyou people to stand up and fight for
\nyour heritage, and you did and it
\nwas beautiful. . . Six million
\ntelegrams were received at the White
\nHouse . . . The people spoke,
\nthe people won. It was a radiant
\neruption of democracy. That sort of
\nthing isn’t likely to happen
\nagain. Because, in the bottom of<\/em>
\nall our terrified souls, we all know<\/em>
\nthat democracy is a dying giant, a<\/em>
\nsick, sick dying, decaying political<\/em>
\nconcept, writhing in its final pain.<\/em><\/p>\n

I don’t mean the United States is
\nfinished as a world power. The
\nUnited States is the most powerful,
\nthe richest, the most advanced
\ncountry in the world, light-years
\nahead of any other country. And I
\ndon’t mean the Communists are going
\nto take over the world. The
\nCommunists are deader than we are.
\nWhat’s finished is the idea that<\/em>
\nthis great country is dedicated to<\/em>
\nthe freedom and flourishing of every<\/em>
\nindividual in it. It’s the<\/em>
\nindividual that’s finished. It’s<\/em>
\nthe single, solitary human being<\/em>
\nwho’s finished. It’s every single<\/em>
\none of you out there who’s finished.<\/em>
\nBecause this is no longer a nation<\/em>
\nof independent individuals.<\/em> This is
\na nation of two hundred odd million
\ntransistorized, deodorized,
\nwhiter-than-white, steel-belted
\nbodies, totally unnecessary as human
\nbeings and as replaceable as piston
\nrods — Well, the time has come to say:
\nis dehumanization such a bad word?
\nBecause good or bad, that’s what’s
\nso. The whole world is becoming
\nhumanoid, creatures that look human
\nbut aren’t. The whole world, not
\njust us. We’re just the most
\nadvanced country, so we’re getting
\nthere first — The whole world’s . . .
\nbecoming mass-produced, programmed,
\nwired, insensate things, useful only
\nto produce and consume other
\nmass-produced things, all of them as
\nunnecessary and useless as we are —
\n— that’s the simple truth you
\nhave to grasp, that human existence
\nis an utterly futile and purposeless
\nthing — because once you’ve grasped
\nthat, then the whole universe becomes
\norderly and comprehensible . . . This
\nworld quite simply is a vast cosmology
\nof small corporations orbiting around
\nlarger corporations who, in turn,
\nrevolve around giant corporations —
\nand this whole, endless, ultimate
\ncosmology is expressly designed for
\nthe production and consumption of
\nuseless things —<\/p>\n

P.S. Howard Beale’s new message was a major flop. UBS ratings plummeted in a very short time. To save face, USB hired an assassin who took out Beale while he was on the air. According to reports, his was the first known instance of a man who was killed because he had lousy ratings.<\/strong><\/p>\n

P.S. 2 For his performance as Howard Beale, Peter Finch won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Ironically, it was a posthumous award. He died several months after film completion. He was 60.<\/strong><\/p>\n

www.conventionofstates.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ed: This piece is about fiction and non-fiction.\u00a0 It’s rather long (1812 words), but\u00a0 a snappy sort of read. Sincerest thanks to SAC. Sidney Aaron “Paddy” Chayefsky won three Academy Awards, making him the only three-time solo recipient of a screenwriting Oscar. The third was for Network, a brutal satire about the Television Industry. Paddy’s … Continue reading 1976 vs 2023<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3424"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3448,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3424\/revisions\/3448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steammarketing.com\/fodder\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}