Revenge Of The Herds
Today in the NY Times (well, yesterday) there was an article - "No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances", and starts out:
"When Seth Shepsle goes to Starbucks, he orders a 'medium' because 'grande' - as the coffee company calls the size, the one between big and small - annoys him."
The article goes on to describe various folks' methods of getting pointless revenge at things that annoy them and they can't control. Attacking junk mail by stuffing business-reply envelopes and sending them back, so the companies have to pay twice for their marketing efforts. Signing known spammers up for catalogs and junk mail. Insisting on ordering a "small" pizza at Pizza Hut, even though medium is the smallest size.
These trivial tactics against daily inconveniences supposedly give individuals a "private sense of satisfaction," but I peg it as doing quite the opposite. Focusing ones effort, fixating ones energy; what better way to cement the idiosyncrasy firmly on the desktop of your mind? If only we could swap these pointless nuances of everyday life, with homelessness, racism, global warming, and the myriad other important issues that we choose to step over, look past, and ignore on a daily basis.
If you Google "revenge" some interesting results pop up. Commercialism prevails, even in this sector of the human ego. The first result is for "revenge unlimited", a company specializing in products and pranks and advice on how to get, yes, revenge. The third one down is the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith website. You can find online voodoodolls, to "get back at your boss spouse, sports, politician, etc." Scroll down a bit further, and another movie site comes up, for "Revenge of the Nerds." IMDB comes up with 32 movies, actually.
It's amazing how integral the concept of revenge is in the human psyche. Maybe i'm just as revengeful and haven't realized my true potential yet, or maybe I just avoid the confrontation. Which reminds me of this article on "manliness" I read today....
Enough rambling, time for the first (of hopefully many) neighborhood happy hours. I've been meaning to get back at my liver for a while now.
"When Seth Shepsle goes to Starbucks, he orders a 'medium' because 'grande' - as the coffee company calls the size, the one between big and small - annoys him."
The article goes on to describe various folks' methods of getting pointless revenge at things that annoy them and they can't control. Attacking junk mail by stuffing business-reply envelopes and sending them back, so the companies have to pay twice for their marketing efforts. Signing known spammers up for catalogs and junk mail. Insisting on ordering a "small" pizza at Pizza Hut, even though medium is the smallest size.
These trivial tactics against daily inconveniences supposedly give individuals a "private sense of satisfaction," but I peg it as doing quite the opposite. Focusing ones effort, fixating ones energy; what better way to cement the idiosyncrasy firmly on the desktop of your mind? If only we could swap these pointless nuances of everyday life, with homelessness, racism, global warming, and the myriad other important issues that we choose to step over, look past, and ignore on a daily basis.
If you Google "revenge" some interesting results pop up. Commercialism prevails, even in this sector of the human ego. The first result is for "revenge unlimited", a company specializing in products and pranks and advice on how to get, yes, revenge. The third one down is the Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith website. You can find online voodoodolls, to "get back at your boss spouse, sports, politician, etc." Scroll down a bit further, and another movie site comes up, for "Revenge of the Nerds." IMDB comes up with 32 movies, actually.
It's amazing how integral the concept of revenge is in the human psyche. Maybe i'm just as revengeful and haven't realized my true potential yet, or maybe I just avoid the confrontation. Which reminds me of this article on "manliness" I read today....
Enough rambling, time for the first (of hopefully many) neighborhood happy hours. I've been meaning to get back at my liver for a while now.
posted by jb at 16.3.05
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