ON SfS, IDIOCY, AND THE FUTURE Whither Songs for Scotland? Whither this Facebook page? In the beginning, nearly a year ago, this page was created as a focal point for Scottish pro-indy musical creativity, and also to promote the SfS Festival, SfS the downloadable album, and SfS the film. Missions accomplished. Regarding this page in particular: the volcanic outpouring of musical creativity occasioned by the indyref this past summer both here in Scotland and around the world was amazing — no — well beyond amazing. It was astounding! How about 2015? Might there be another SfS event? Anything’s possible. Watch this page. Many of the ‘pro Yes’ institutions (and this page is a microscopically small one) have been in search of a mission since September 19th. This page has continued to post songs with short commentaries, for example my recent series of Burns songs. These are intended as ‘short takes’, to inform, to raise the spirits, and also very importantly, to inspire the imagination. So far, so good (well, they inspired me anyway). We’ll continue to post songs as and when we are able, and yes, we are still looking for suitable contributions from musicians in Scotland and from elsewhere to post. Keep sending them (but bear in mind that we are volunteers running this page). Since the Indyref we have also been posting the occasional news article concerning Scotland and its continuing independence movement. This too will continue. Now, about idiocy. First, a definition from Wikipedia: ‘An idiot, dolt, or dullard is an intellectually disabled person, or someone who acts in a self-defeating or significantly counterproductive way.’ Does this sound familiar? Does it remind you of this world as it has been ORGANISED FOR US by our ruling elites, now in 2015? Does me. The derivation of this word is extremely interesting (I first learned of this from an Alasdair Gray essay). Here it is: ‘An idiot in Athenian democracy was someone who was characterised by self-centredness and concerned almost exclusively with private—as opposed to public—affairs.[6] Idiocy was the natural state of ignorance into which all persons were born and its opposite, citizenship, was effected through formalised education.[6] In Athenian democracy, idiots were born and citizens were made through education (although citizenship was also largely hereditary).’ This also is all too familiar. I date the beginning of our modern age of idiocy (or if you like, our ’age of greed’) to the Reagan/Thatcher era, when everything became all about ‘me and my stuff’. In 2015, if humanity is to have any worthwhile future, we simply can’t afford idiocy anymore (Shrub Bush was almost more than our planet could take all on his own). We must each of therefore as a first priority educate ourselves, as we well know that the mainstream media is there only to indoctrinate us to be ‘good consumers’ and ‘obedient citizens’. Therefore I will also be running some recommended ‘think pieces’ on this page, about where we are now as a species, and what the future may hold for us if we don’t change our ways. The first is this article by Dr. Chris Martenson, a US scientist and a fantastic writer and communicator. It analyses the present and likely future state of our world in terms of energy supplies. Here’s an inducement: read this and you’ll likely be much less concerned about the prospect of fracking in Scotland’s central belt anytime soon. But you ought, by the same token, to become extremely concerned about our planetary energy outlook. I follow the Peak Prosperity website regularly and highly recommend it. In particular, listening to the ‘Crash Course’ series of podcasts is time very well spent. peakprosperity/blog/90662/keep-your-eyes-prize
Posted on: Fri, 02 Jan 2015 18:31:30 +0000