red shoes, red skillet

    I was coming out of the shower when Z100 abruptly switches to ads (don’t you hate it when radio stations do that?) and the first one was about buying stars. The ad suggested we all buy stars for people on our Christmas lists this year because it’s an “eternal” gift and yada yada yada. The ad was pretty long, a good two minutes explaining the virtues of buying a star how the gift recipient will have their name on a US copyright list and how they’ll get an official certificate of ownership and I was reeling…buying stars is bull.

I mean, it’s a sweet gesture for your girlfriend if you guys like astronomy–like in A Walk to Remember. But otherwise, I think it’s a really frivolous thing, buying a star when there are billions and billions in the universe. Why do we have to own stars? You can’t build a spaceship and sail to your star later, or extract stardust from it to make things, or destroy it. They also all look the same, essentially. And how would you know your star was really your star?

Star-buying, aside from being frivolous, is wrong. I believe it is wrong, because it’s like owning a section of ocean or a slice of sky–you just don’t do that. What is the European obsession with owning things? With being supreme?

Today in Philosophy we read a story–Hermann Hesse’s “The European.” It was a simple, well-written story about a great flood after a great war. On an ark are gathered two of each of the world’s creatures, as well as outstanding humans. The last man pulled from the water onto the ark is a European, a white man. While adrift in the water, he had concentrated all his energy into writing down how his nation had soundly defeated the other nations, and had fought until the last cannon ran dry. On the ark, he still writes. He is alone on the ark and does not interact with the other humans and creatures.

Later, it is decided among the ark’s inhabitants that there should be a contest, a show of every creature’s best talent. Everyone signs up and performs–squirrels running, showing their nimbleness, chameleons showing their color-changing tricks, the African running effortlessly across a beam, the Malayan folding three leaves into a propeller-type thing. Finally, it is the European’s turn, and at first he refuses to showcase his talent, making excuses and protesting no. But eventually he gives in and explains that he cannot show his talent, for it is intellect.

I can, he explained, create worlds using the observations I have made in this one. Everyone laughs at him, disagrees with him, and ultimately applauds him for being funny.

The last scene is of the African, Hindu, Malayan, and Chinaman approaching Noah about the European, asking why they have kept him on the ark when he has no true discernible talent and is not merry at all. Noah responds that the European is here to remind us of the past, remind us why the world was flooded and purged in the first place. The European, pale as he is, is a ghost for us to learn from. He has no wife or any kin on the ark, unlike the African and Eskimo, and if he wises to further this humankind, then he must dip into the pool of multicolored people.

First off, I thought this story was brilliant, and I stand by Hesse’s views on Europeans and imperialism (the broader idea here) 100 percent. Second, the point of relating “The European” to star-buying is the obsession with owning things. White people (oh I don’t give a damn about political correctness, “Caucasian” is too many syllables) don’t have a sense of community like the Japanese, or any Asian culture, do. In Japan, people strive for the betterment of the community and regularly sacrifice themselves for their community (according to my Japanophile sociology teacher, whose term project I should be writing right now). In America, it is every one for himself. Why do we have shows like American Gladiator and Survivor?  Because they love to win.

It’s now 8:33 and I stopped writing to eat dinner at…7:28. So naturally, I’ve lost my train of thought.

Until next time, then.