Through my own vigorous research and divinations I can now reveal the mastermind behind our misfortune. One Mr. Walter Elias Disney. It’s the vestiges of Walt’s narcissist ideology that has led us to this place. The thought that Beauty can marry that mean ugly bastard Beast for love and be rewarded with unending “Happy ever afters”, that toiling for two hideously ugly sisters will bring a prince to your door with your missing shoe (that used to be an item of household grocery before midnight?) and the thought that you too are entitled a dreamland where wealth, health and happiness await you all the days of your life.
Walter started in simplier times, in Kansas City animating laugh-o-grams (the cartoons not the drug). He didn’t mean for you lot to take him seriously. He is up there in the misunderstood category with Allah and Jesus who too preached love and compassion and on whose behalf foul and murderous deeds were instigated on man’s fellow man. Walter showed us a magical place, a place of dreams and wonderment. His first animated success in Hollywood came with “Alice Comedies” based on Alice in Wonderland. “Oh Walter, why did they have to follow you down the hole.”
Walters trueism that was taken to heart by his generation’s offshoot was the destruction of the class system and the promotion of self before the collective. A shell shocked generation, weary by war spoiled their children, embellishing their hopes and dreams and the heady, giddy, joys of the sixties were born. When the euphoria wore off and they realised that peace and love wasn’t going to be forthcoming they retreated to middle age and disgruntled servitude but they never forgot that dream and foisted it onto their own children to carry it around like a basket of testicles, ever so gently, so that it may some day shoot forth in a rich creamy orgasm of creation and self indulgence. The dream is Horatio Alger, rags to riches in a day without the lottery but on the back of one’s great and glorious self, talent and hard work are optional add-ons.
There is no other way of explaining the current generation of humans we have fielded on to this burning down planet of ours. Let’s take the top of the pile, our politicians. These are the people we elect by the people from the people to be our responsible governance, to make our laws and dictate our directions. These persons are meant to be representative and the representatives of society. What we have are squabbling children whose whole persona is based around the ego. Bertie Ahern’s policies were so god-damn awful that he ditched them and ran, and won, an entire election on the back of his personality. Just him, the man down the road. The friendly accountant with no bank account and unexplained cash sloshing around won on a horse he can’t even remember. He’s not the only one, Barack Obama, can you name one member of his cabinet besides Hilary, the other bobble head ego? Do you know where he stands on the issues, any issue? Just a thought. It’s just a presidential version of X factor where the winner gets a nice white house and a big shiny red button that they are NEVER supposed to touch. For God-sake, don’t elect Sponge Bob.
Let’s stay on X factor, the gaudiest bobble of the lot. Where the gullible queue in the thousands ready to be packaged, exploited and resold back to the masses. The appeal is that through little talent, no back work and a propensity for Karaoke you can be a global star. A fame prostitute held up as a shiny new penny but one whose value will depreciate until you are cast aside for a new years mint, another cutting on the editing floor. The failing isn’t X factor itself but a clink in the modern human condition. The exploitation of the “me” factor. Girls and camp looking guys have been sleeping in their little glass caskets and are ready to cast it off to live out their days amongst the richness of the fairytale.
In case you think this self promotion is relegated to the lower echelons of society take a look at the banking sector in which self promotion is joined in unholy matrimony with its incestuous brother “entitlement”. That is why bankers in the US have taken the public bail out monies and paid themselves BILLIONS in bonuses. Greed knows no class bounds and self praise is worth a lot more than nothing.
Okay okay, it’s starting to resemble a rant and who has time for all these macro considerations so lets go back to Walter’s happy ending. Love. The cornerstone of society and the inspiration for Beethoven, for Shakespeare and the reason Van Gogh cut off his ear for his sweetheart to mind. The pillaging of collective values has relegated love to a shopping list. Little girls dream of prince charming with a shiny new steed ( a Porsche is good I hear) to come sweep them off their feet so they can have many epidural affected C sectioned children to run around playfully in their Italian marbled summer home in Venice. Let me break it to you now girls, he ain’t coming. As for fella’s, they are no better, they want an angel faced virgin who is naturally born with bedroom tricks that would make a Geisha go for the ice cabinet and a quiet lie down, the ability to let them watch sports when the soaps are on and to never, ever, question where they were when they stumble home, vomit on the couch and then sleep on it. It ain’t gonna happen, she’s gonna kick your hole. Most people now meet their spouse’s on-line these days where they can filter suitors with their own individual style of bigotry. They will promptly invent a cover story more in line with the fairytale. “Oh, we met at a children’s orphanage in Beruit where we were both doing some volunteer work on Christmas day”. You know who you are.
An entire market of bullshit has grown around this promotion of self. Self help books, Self realisation. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Seminars, weekend retreats all tapping into to this vast, never-ending market of self. How you can realise your unrealistic wants by asking the Universe for it. (By the way, all you have to do is ask the universe and then work really, really hard for it, and it might happen says the author) Is it any wonder that children raised with Santa and the Tooth-fairy don’t want to grow up and want the stream of presents to continue. Do we ever really grow out of being selfish? The key it seems to me is, and wait for it this might be hard to accept. Living in Reality. A little hope is a good thing but we have a disgruntled generation who expect fame and sucess to come knocking on their door. A little humility would be more in line from responsible parents to bestow. The real world is not a fairy-tale. Yes, some of us strike it lucky, but if you examine it more often than not it’s just that, luck. Enterprising individuals that build successful companies have made huge sacrifices in their personal lives for that success. Lawyers, and doctors, you guessed it – study. Everyone is busy peering into other people’s crystal balls and they don’t see the work that went into the little globe or all those jaded persons for whom the dream never happened. Single mothers who are raising children alone because they don’t fit into the fairytale, Cinderella didn’t have no 4 year old. People chasing other kinds of highs living on the streets dying broken and forgotten by our egotistical politicians with us too busy discussing their private lives to poke them about their professional ones. For the record there is a homeless shelter built in Dublin that would house them lying idle due to lack of funds
These are just two examples. It's a way of thinking that has Ireland's public servants threatening industrial action as they are not getting raises when mass amounts of the private sector are being laid of. The old "Fuck them, what about me!" argument that somehow garners sympathy. We’re too busy looking in to bother to look around. Don't believe me? You're wearing shoes probably knitted together by a child halfway across the world, whilst we burn some fossil fuels to fire up the aul computer.
As for me, well I'm no better so I'm off to play the lottery.
Anyway, In case it's all too much of a downer here’s one happy thought from Walt:
Mickey Mouse is concerned about his and Minnie's marriage, and sees a counselor. At the end of the session, the counselor agrees to speak with Minnie.
The counselor says to Mickey "I spoke with your wife, and I must say, I didn't find any evidence of mental instability; she is not crazy."
Mickey says "Crazy!? I never said Minnie is crazy. I said she's fucking Goofy!"
The counselor says to Mickey "I spoke with your wife, and I must say, I didn't find any evidence of mental instability; she is not crazy."
Mickey says "Crazy!? I never said Minnie is crazy. I said she's fucking Goofy!"
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