Dances with Avatars

Two of the highest grossing films of all time are about something I am experiencing now… So why do I feel so out on a limb? Both James Cameron’s ‘Avatar’ and Kevin Costner’s ‘Dances with wolves’ were tales of how someone realised the horrors of colonialism and made the drastic decision to side with the colonised.

It’s the bloody autism innit? I look at something and see the wrongness and out it blurts and there I am, upsetting people again. But… it was the right thing to do! Honest!

Now, as everybody else will happily point out to me, the right thing to do is very rarely the smart thing to do and it is often the polar opposite, and when you slap a chapter in your book about the housing crisis about the damage caused by an influx of very insular (mostly) Londoners, don’t be surprised when the local paper that is riddled with them will not touch you or your book with a bargepole. I could quite easily have whipped that part out and got a bit more local interest but I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself as they are a major cause of the housing crisis where I live.

I was talking to a local friend this morning who was complaining that they had been recommended on social media. What is wrong with that you might ask? Well the problem was that it was on a page dedicated to and run by these interlopers. Not all (I hasten’t to add) but most want something for nothing and are constantly complaining and throwing their weight around and many local people simply won’t deal with them anymore. Those born here watch their children struggle to rent pokey flats in the grimmest of areas while they walk past streets that are empty all week and then they have the cheek to ask for discounts… Tacky!

It comes to something when even the new renter’s union consists of many of these small scale colonists, homeowners and those linked to landlords to-boot; as far as I’m concerned that is all about as sane and wise as creating the Myra Hindley children’s playgroup and creche. How can anyone fix a problem that they are instrumental in creating? It hardly makes them able to clearly evaluate the cause of escalating rents and massive shortages when they have helped caused them. Sadly, no one listens to me though… Ho Hum.

As is painfully obvious to all but the most unhinged of people, life is not like the movies. People like myself who stand up for what is right against overwhelming odds tend to get squashed like bugs rather than rewarded with a freeze frame and a fade to black. Sadly, I’m too daft and or stubborn to act any other way.

The Holy Trinity

It’s a sad indictment of society but you can learn everything you need to know about our world from three 80’s Sci Fi Movies. I would like to thank my nineties stoner self for watching them on repeat courtesy of my VHS player. In no particular order these great artefacts of universal wisdom are ‘They Live’ , ‘Robocop’ and Terminator. There are two other important nineties films but that will give me an excuse to write something else without thinking too hard.

Most people haven’t heard of ‘They Live’ as it’s more of a cult movie. It’s one John Carpenter’s lesser know works; He of Halloween and Escape From New York fame. It is the tale of an everyday working guy hit upon hard times, played by American Wrestler Roddy Piper. Things take a dramatic turn as he discovers a pair of sunglasses that allow him to see the world as it truly is, which is one where alien overlords are controlling the population through the media and are intentionally polluting the planet so that it will become more compatible with their physiognomy. Replace aliens with mega rich and the environmental conspiracy which capitalism’s incompatibility with the planet and it all starts to make far too much sense.

Robocop is slightly better known and the most important and scarily accurate prediction was OCP, Omni Consumer Products a behemoth corporation that owned pretty much everything and everyone. Created by the incredibly wise Paul Verhoeven, he managed to slip brilliant allegories of politics and capitalism into some seemingly trashy movies. OCP owned the banks, the food supply, the police and with Robocop, even people. One only has to look at the likes of Blackrock or Amazon to see exactly where the world is heading.

Last of the three is James Cameron’s The Terminator, the classic Arnie Sci-Fi, which predicted the internet and AI decades before their reality. Every time I learn of a new way that human beings have been robbed of their agency or had their creativity undermined, I mumble ‘Skynet’ under my breath as I watch the world I know slowly disintegrate.

I had an interesting incident with Instagram recently where a disability charity was asking me what suggestions I could give to help those that are also neurodivergent. I suggested that I would like the ability to communicate via email rather that live chats and their soulless AI bots… The comment was instantly removed for accuracy. AI is already protecting itself it seems.