A message from Gene Roddenberry to the world

[puckster_guy]

http://www.sott.net/article/291711-A-message-from-Gene-Roddenberry-to-the-world

 

Comment: The following is a short excerpt of a transcript of a live talk given by Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, to an audience. Today, his words are still as relevant as, if not more than, in his own days.
 

I think probably the most often asked question about the show is: Why the Star Trek Phenomenon?

And it could be an important question because you can ask:

How can a simple space opera with blinking lights and zap-guns and a goblin with pointy ears reach out and touch the hearts and minds of literally millions of people and become a cult in some cases?

Obviously, what this means is, that television has incredible power.

They are saying that if Star Trek can do this, then perhaps another carefully calculated show could move people in other directions as to keep selfish interest to creating other cults for selfish purposes: industrial, cartels, political parties, governments.

Ultimate power in this world, as you know, has always been one simple thing: the control and manipulation of minds.

Fortunately, in the attempt however to manipulate people through any so called Star Trek Formula , is doomed to failure, and I'll tell you why in just a moment. First of all, our show did not reach and affect all these people because it was deep and great literature.

Star Trek was not Ibsen or Shakespeare. To get a prime time show -- network show -- on the air and to keep it there, you must attract and hold a minimum of 18 million people every week.

You have to do that in order to move people away from Gomer Pyle, Bonanza, Beverly Hill Billies and so on. And we tried to do this with entertainment, action, adventure, conflict and so on.

But once we got on the air, and within the limits of those accident ratio limits, we did not accept the myth that the television audience has an infantile mind. We had an idea, and we had a premise, and we still believe that.

As a matter of fact we decided to risk the whole show on that premise.

Gene Roddenberry

We believed that the often ridiculed mass audience is sick of this world's petty nationalism and all it's old ways and old hatreds, and that people are not only willing but anxious to think beyond most petty beliefs that have for so long kept mankind divided.

So you see that the formula, the magic ingredient that many people keep seeking and many of them keep missing is really not in Star Trek.

It is in the audience. There is an intelligent life form out on the other side of that television too.

The whole show was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate, but to take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms.

We tried to say that the worst possible thing that can happen to all of us is for the future to somehow press us into a common mould, where we begin to act and talk and look and think alike. If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind, here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that is almost certainly out there.

And I think that this is what people responded to.

The result of that was that seven years after being dropped by the network because of saying those things, there are now more people watching it than ever before.

And if you ascribe those things to any mystic or scriptural brilliance in Star Trek, you miss the entire point.

For Star Trek proofs, as faulty as individual episodes could be, that the much-maligned common man and common woman has an enormous hunger for brotherhood. They are ready for the 23rd century now, and they are light-years ahead of their petty governments and their visionless leaders.

 

[wc41]

WOW.......relevant big time!!! 

[umbertino]

Grazie for sharing, my Friend.

[darwinatridge]

Escapism & Distraction As a Social Control During the Roman Empire

 

Escapism and distraction are social controls that can be employed by a governing body to hide inadequacies or divert attention from themes that can cause malcontent among the populace. It is important to distinguish between the two; distraction refers to anything that can take the attention of the populace away from the inadequacies of the government where as escapism refers to specifically removing the minds of the individuals from the situation that they are in, in order to escape anything that brings discontent to their lives.

Distraction

Distraction was a tool that could be used by Emperors both to divert attention from current objectionable events. Impending risk of warfare increased anxiety within Roman society, the development of gladiatorial spectacle could both demonstrate the continuing competence of the governing body of Rome, even during a crisis (Futrell 2006). Not only could the gladiatorial spectacle distract the citizens from contemporary issues but it could also "erase public memories of political blunders" in the past (Shelton 1998, p333).

Distraction from warfare was an obvious connection, however distraction could also be used to keep "the populace amused and out of mischief" (Lewis and Reinhold, 1990, p142). Auguet (1994, p185) further added weight to this view by describing gladiatorial spectacle as "a first rate means of keeping people amused". Grant (1967, p104) also agreed with this concept exclaiming that Emperors expressed the wish that the "potentially unruly and dangerous city population" be "amused", also adding the idea that this would and keep them "quiet".

As stated earlier (see Literature Review) the first reported date of the gladiatorial spectacle was in 264 BCE and at the time of the First Punic War. The second recorded date of the gladiatorial spectacle was not until 216 BCE again coinciding with a year of war in which the battle of Cannae took place (Shadrake 2005). This leaves a gap of almost 50 years in which there is no record of any gladiatorial spectacle having taken place in the Roman Empire. It seems too much of a coincidence that these two sets of gladiatorial spectacle positioned almost 50 years apart, just happened to fall on times of conflict. A more likely explanation is that these gladiatorial spectacles were put on to distract the people from the turmoil of war. Another explanation is that there were gladiatorial spectacles that fell within this 50 year gap, but they were not particularly noteworthy, and greater publicity was generated for these two recorded games again for the purpose of distraction of the masses.

Escapism

Escapism could well be the biggest factor in social control that gladiatorial spectacles had over its audience. In contemporary society there are a number of escapisms that are available even to those who do not have a large disposable income. Some of the most popular escapisms in modern society such as television, the internet, film, and computer games were not accessible to the Romans. Granted they had food, literature and recreational games, but none of these can draw comparison with the hold that television and the internet has on society today. This is where the gladiatorial spectacles came into play; they provided the audience with a complete distraction from their mundane day to day lives. The comradery of sitting amongst their peers, the historical stories that some of the spectacles told, and the opportunity to wrap oneself up in the glory of Rome, provided the ideal escape from issues of war, disease, political unrest that may have otherwise had a more detrimental affect on the psychology of the population.

Kyle (2007, p301) stated that attendees of gladiatorial spectacles, utilised them to "escape their deplorable living conditions". Shelton (1998, p334) further elaborates declaring that political figures hoped that these diversions would "take people's minds off problems like unemployment and food shortages". According to Shelton (1998, p349) viewing the gladiatorial spectacles would allow "people who themselves felt powerless and brutalised" to find "some satisfaction in watching the infliction of pain on others".

 

http://ezinearticles.com/?Escapism-and-Distraction-As-a-Social-Control-During-the-Roman-Empire&id=1994197

[umbertino]

Interesting

[puckster_guy]

Grazie for sharing, my Friend.

TY Bro