Organized Ignorance

I'm officially boycotting professional sports. It's a matter of principle. The amount of money spent on them is ridiculous. At the bar I work in, I have to keep sports on the tv. The highest played MLB player signed a $300 million contract to get $30,000,000 a year for the next ten years. And he got a $10k signing bonus. That's on ONE player. In a sport that isn't even the most strenuous. We spend billions of dollars every year on entertainment! It doesn't even benefit us in any way. Imagine if all the people who spend their money on sports spent half of that on education or medical research. It is ridiculous to me that we would even allow such a gross expenditure on something as trivial as sports. Don't get me wrong. I think organized sports are good for team building and character enhancement and exercise and even acquiring some skills, but an athlete does not need $30 million a year. Pay them, but be realistic. Does someone who runs down a field and catches a football really deserve $15,000,000? If every athlete gave half their check (or honestly like 3/4) to education or to medical research then I'd be a little happier about it. Not to mention the fact that teachers don't even get $100,000 a year. The person who spends almost as much time teaching and molding your children as you do. Being a teacher should be what you dream of. To be able to teach the next generation. Help them avoid the pitfalls of our society. But everyone wants to be a basketball player. So we have exceptionally skilled golfers and disappointingly subpar teachers. If the tables were turned we would have people striving to be better teachers instead of better jumpers. What is really important? We are an ignorant species to allow such stagnancy in our society. To allow ourselves, for decades now, to complain about the situation our country is in. How can we be mad for a situation we perpetuate? The day we put everything back into the society and the world and we still can't make it is the day I'll stop preaching. Stop being so blind, people. Wake up! This is our world. There is a past, but at this rate we have no future. Don't just brush it off and say, "Oh this generation is the problem." Or, "I can't do anything because I'm just a person with no money or status to persuade anyone." If you are alive then you have no excuse in not speaking out. Use your voice. In the end all we are is our voices. If everyone spoke up, the demands of the people would be a roaring fury of change. We have nothing but the things we fight for. The moment you say, "I can't do anything," that is the moment you give up.

Emphatically,
Mav


PS: This is artist Pawel Kuczynski. He's got some really inspiring work, so take five minutes to check him out and then take another hour discussing these pieces with someone else.

This is that blip on the radar screen.

So I was driving home from work, I'm a bartender now, and I was listening to the radio. They were having a debate about a guy who got a DUI for steering a car 9 feet. He didn't have the keys, the car was not turned on. They were pushing it to get it out of the way because it was blocking another car. The cop watched this happen and then went and got the guy in trouble. So the question was whether or not the guy should've gotten a DUI. It's a grey area. The law states that you are not allowed to "operate" a vehicle. Well, technically this guy was operating, but let's not ignore the fact that that cop is a total prick and totally entrapped the guy. And last I checked, here in America, entrapment is a crime in and of itself. But they had callers and they all thought he shouldn't have gotten it but one person. The last person they had call in said that she strongly thought he should not have gotten a DUI because her husband got one for talking to his sister while sitting drunk on a four wheeler with the keys in his pocket. They got him because they said he had the "potential" to drive. What the fuck? Since when does potential become action? We can't arrest someone for the "potential" to commit crimes. This isn't Minority Report. Everything has potential to turn sinister. I drive but I could potentially hit someone so should I be arrested for potential manslaughter? I walk down streets should I get a ticket for potentially loitering? Where's the god damn line? The potential to commit a crime is not a crime committed. If that were the case then everyone should be in jail.

Heatedly,
Mav


"An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind."