Well, like one of these. I’m looking for a stuffed animal that resembles either Bentley (top) or Sophie (bottom) for some video shorts. Doesn’t even really have to be a dog, either–just reminiscent of the general shape and color.
If you see anything online or while you’re out and about, email or DM me. Thanks.
Today is the 44th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Considering Dr. King and his work, I am more convinced than ever that the vast majority of humanity’s negative tendencies and actions spring, at their root, from fear. Hate, envy, selfishness–it all comes from fear. Fear of the unknown, fear we don’t measure up, fear of not getting as much as the other guy gets.
And, most of all, fear of what we do not understand, and what we can never hope or learn to control.
You know what we can learn to control? OUR FEAR.
Tell yourself today that while you cannot control everything, you will not let fear control you.
(UPDATE: After Creative Loafing went to press, video surfaced that appears to show George Zimmerman immediately following the Trayvon Martin shooting. And people are already seeing more than it shows.)
Back in the very early ’90s, I caught a documentary on cable about America’s then-nascent culture of candid video. (Don’t hold me to it, but I believe it was an episode of HBO’s America Undercover series titled “Surveillance: No Place to Hide.”) It was full of manipulative, button-pushy emotional swings typical of programs made by folks who don’t want to come right out and tell you that THE WORLD IS GOING TO SHIT, PEOPLE — in the interest of journalistic integrity, they balance the doomsaying with a few beneficial elements, and let the music and the tone do the talking.
So you got, like, 45 amusing seconds of a naked guy caught locking himself out of his apartment by the building’s security camera, and 45 harrowing minutes of hockey-dad fights and gay-bashing and dash-cam footage of state troopers getting shot and stuffed into the trunks of the stolen sedans they pulled over for burned-out blinker bulbs. I vividly remember a segment in which a group of troglodytic kids steal a tourist’s camcorder and tape themselves gleefully beating said tourist unconscious. It might’ve been the first time in history a video made by criminals of their own crimes was used as evidence in their prosecution.
Sure, I could spend the next 20 minutes on YouTube viewing all manner of carnage, mayhem and pranks that end with surgical staples, and I wouldn’t be bothered in the same way. I’d probably be bothered in that vague my-soul-needs-a-shower sort of way. But come on; destructive young morons are hoisted by their own cinema-verite petards about once a week on average, and real-life death is just another prime-time entertainment option.
Overwhelmingly mediocre rock act Shinedown is putting out a digital-media companion to its new album Amaryllis, available for $5.99 through Apple’s iBooks tomorrow. The iPad-friendly tome reportedly features member background, making-of stories and ruminations about the album’s artwork, among other things.
Which, whatever. This is America, and if a generic rock group wants to try to gouge another six bucks out of its fans, that’s fine. What irks me about it is the fact that Shinedown members and peripheral actors insist on comparing this thing to the liner notes and expansive supplemental materials of the records of yore–which, if I remember correctly, CAME FREE WITH THE ALBUM. This isn’t a love letter to the experience of recording an album or a bold new experiment–if it were, and if the guys in Shinedown gave a shit about their fans, the album itself would include a code entitling the buyer to a free copy. It’s a money grab, pure and simple.
Scott Harrell has written for Creative Loafing, RADAR, the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune, the Bradenton Herald, Naughty America and more. He lives in Saint Petersburg, Florida and enjoys creating awkward silences during dinner with strangers.
