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Treason doth never prosper
What’s the reason?
Why, when it prospers
none dare call it treason.
Behind the Times
By Michael Burgess
Each year on the fourth o f July, America
celebrates Independence Day. Before the fireworks
start, let's all go to our quiet place, sit down and think
things through.
When it comes to fuzzy thinking, few notions
are more absurd or dangerous than independence.
Worse than meaningless, it’s a mental construct bom o f
misunderstanding and insufficient data, a myth that was
long o f tooth when, a century ago, Albert Einstein and
Max Planck discovered the world w e knew didn’t exist.
Relativity showed us that, no matter how things
seem to the self important, there are no privileged
perspectives in the universe. Surrounding any point in
the continuum, there exists an infinite array o f
perspectives, all o f them unique: none o f them is the real
one, none o f them is absolute, none o f them is holy. All
o f us just points o f view in the curved geometry o f
space/ time. Quantum theory unveiled the world as an
infinite array o f probabilities. Observed reality, the one
with the greatest probability, turns out to be a
collaborative magic between the observer and the
observed: what w e see depends largely on who we are
and what w e’re looking for. This is not, for the
thoughtful, a universe in which the term independent
makes much sense. In simplest terms, it lacks any
meaningful referent.
Consider the situation. For an object or an event
to be independent, it must be unaffected by the reality
that surrounds it. The outside world (another
meaningless term) cannot influence either its internal
state or its external momentum: which is to say, who or
what it is and whatever it is that it’s doing. To be
independent, an object or an event, be it a human, an art
form or a civilization, must act always and only on its
own volition, pursuing its bliss unswayed by the
perspectives and realities arising and unfolding around
it. Even less likely, it must somehow manage to do this
while seamlessly imbedded in a space/time geometry
that disallows separation o f one thing from another.
As nearly as we can tell, and w e can tell now
pretty nearly, objects and events are waves o f actualized
potential. Like ripples in a pond, they’re not just
interdependent they’re interpenetrating. Like the notes
in a jazz riff there is no place where one wave ends and
another begins. There is no this and that, no us and
them, no thee and me. Given what we know, merely to
speak o f independence implies, if not an irrational state,
a boneheaded unwillingness to accept matters as they
are. To know the truth and live a lie frustrates the spirit
and disfigures the soul. We would be less foolish to
behave as i f the world were flat.
The faithful will, o f course, remind us that
Independence Day commemorates our liberation from
tyranny and our birth as a sovereign state, a nation
among nations, a lamp post o f liberty and freedom. We
should beat the drum slowly when we speak o f these
things. With the exception o f Plymouth, the colonies
weren’t havens for the persecuted and downtrodden:
they were business ventures chartered for the purpose o f
turning a profit. The notions o f liberty and freedom that
life in the wilderness naturally fosters were the effect o f
colonization, not the cause. In both theory and practice,
mercantilism (an activity involving stealing raw
materials and selling the shiny junk you make out o f it
back to the same rubes) was, as business plans go, every
bit as pitiless and reptilian as the corporate capitalism it
spawned. The colonies were a business deal and the
American Revolution was a political event mostly
commemorating a falling out between trading partners
Our country was bom, not because our founding father
figures (all o f them prominent businessmen) were losing
sleep worrying about peasants struggling under the
brutal yoke o f foreign domination, but because our
businessmen wanted a better deal and their businessmen
told us to, in so many words, go suck a prune. A good
case can be made that the Revolution was corporate
America’s first hostile takeover. Our fight for
independence, by the way, bankrupted France and cost
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette their relatively
innocent heads. Bummer
But hey, at least we were independent.
Independent from what? The interlocking dynasties o f
bankers and merchant princes who invented the check
and had been signing them since the Middle Ages?
Please. The smarmy alliances between power hungry
divine right maniacs and the organized slaughter their
appetites inevitably lead to? Hardly. The same people
still have all the marbles and this country has been at
war nearly every year o f its existence. Ah but, surely
now, squatting like a se lf righteous sumo wrestler at the
top o f the food chain o f goods and services, w e’re
independent. O f what? Oil? Huddled masses yearning
to be farm workers and domestics? If w e’re so
independent, why is there a trade deficit? Why, for that
matter, is there a World Bank? Or a Federal Reserve
System that, rather than being a branch o f the
government, is a slavering cabal o f global bankers who
print the money, rent it to us and tell us when w e have
enough? If we stand tallest because we stand proud and
alone, why can’t we make our own overpriced sneakers?
Why are our Christmas lights made by political prisoners
in China? Why are we choosing sides in South
American drug wars? Why, i f w e’re so damned
independent do global corporations run our government,
and the world, like a fast food franchise?
As much as we're able to know anything, here's
what we now know is true: w e are, all o f us, not merely
connected intimately to each other and to all o f life but
are, on the most fundamental level o f reality,
indistinguishable from any o f it. Our planet is one
world, its people are one people and its life forms are
one life form because the universe is one thing. One sea,
many waves, no islands.
But we were talking about the Fourth o f July. If
the word independence was only meaningless, we
wouldn’t be having this discussion. The meaning
assigned to it implies freedom, a notion often mistaken
for license. Being able to do something is not a mandate
for doing it. The definition o f power is force
unexercised, potential held in reserve. Just as
democracy depends upon an informed electorate,
freedom depends upon enlightened se lf interest which, in
turn, depends upon recognizing the difference between
what feels good and what's right. Like every other bit o f
life in the universe, we are free o f everything but the
consequences o f our actions. The birth o f our nation
was the beginning o f a process o f directed change: a
unique experiment in molding reality according to our
collective will. For a revolution to be a revolution, it can
never stop. As Patrick Henry put it so nicely: “Give me
liberty or give me death.”
Today, he’d be in the streets in front o f the
World Trade Organization.
Happy Revolution Day.
IN THE
Runs th r u S e p te m b e r 2
Every Thurs, Fri & Sat • x j ,
C jp
Sunday Matinees, 2pm: Aug 5 & Sept 2
Doors Open, 7pm • Opening Acts, 730pm
Show Begins, 8pm
T ic k e t» : ¿15-10 • S tu d e n t/S e n io
NAME OF
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Sir John Harrin
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PM TIDES
BOLD TYPE
BASEBALL
Can you feel it? It is like a million people
bolding their breath ('tossing their Fingers. I'rctending not
to notice that the Cubs are still in first place in their
division. With every win we wonder, will this be the last
one? With every loss we wonder if this will be the first one
that will send us tumbling into our usual home at the
bottom of the division Friends laugh and talk aboiM a
Manner vs Cubs World Senes and you curse them under
your breath for putting a hex on. You notice that the Cubs
are being mentioned in the Sports Pages more, but mostly
as an oddity And you curse them You realize the Cubs
haven't been in the Senes since Strom Thurmon was bom
and you curse him. You try Io be cynical and to not give in
to hope Hut in the back of your mind you wonder, is this
the 'next year' w e've awaited for so long? What if they
really do stay in first and make the play o ffs and win the
pennant and face the Manners in the Senes9 What it by
some miracle they win? Will the world come to an end9
Will it cause Armageddon9 Should you really wish for
D is c o u n ts • G r e a t G ro u p R ates
C a ll N O W ! 3 1 5 -6 1 0 4
*
M IC H A E L BALESKY
B O A R D OF D IR EC TO R S
P O
B O X 411 S E A S ID E O R 9 7 1 3 8
www . inthenaaaeof A rt . org
iteceR LcrreMie Juwzooi
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