Ah, the winter doldrums! We have been exceptionally warm here these past few weeks, and, aside from peering over our shoulders for flooding waves rushing off the Greenland glaciers, I suppose we are happy about it. Not so the snowmobilers and skiers and those absolute kooks, ice fisherpersons, but for this writer at least, sidelined as I am with a leg injury, it has most certainly been a plus. But winter is still no picnic. The days have been almost all gray when there is any sunlight at all, and it seems an eternity of boredom and depression has descended upon us.
That’s why, in His infinite mercy, we have been given Netflix, et al. Saints be praised.
But we can watch only so many Tom Cruise action films and Golden Globe winners promoting glitzy post-cultural drivel that will make us want to dye our hair green. So we turn to documentaries, as we did a few days ago. With some of these, and certainly with the one we watched, we sometimes get more than the producers intended.
The hook of this particular one is in the name, “The Axe-wielding Hitchhiker,” which brings up creepy images of Freddy Krueger and ski masks and chainsaws. But that is not what we are left with. Rather, by the end we find a sad emotional basket-case of a young man and a media machine that drove him to murder.
We begin with a bizarre scene of violence captured on people’s cell phones, of a car pinning a public-works man to the back of his truck. A large middle-aged white man emerges from the car screaming out his hatred of black people while announcing that he is the Christ. He’s a nut, and a racist one at that, and a few woman intervene to try to help the black man who is pinned between the vehicles. As they do so, the crazy man grabs one woman in a wrestling hold and seems to be threatening her life when a young long-haired bearded (white) man appears with a hatchet. He hits the crazy man three times in the head with the hatchet (once, we find, with the sharp end) before the crazy man goes down. Police arrive, along with local TV cameras. We see that no one is dead, while one, the long-haired axe-wielder, is pictured walking away from the scene, a large backpack slung on his shoulders. The TV reporter gets the camera man to move over to the young man, who then grants an interview.
Says our hitchhiker, “Yeah, this crazy dude attacks this black dude and then this woman, so I take the hatchet and, like, smash, smash, smash! Got the fucker good,” or something like that. I remember the three-fold “smash.” For visual aid, imagine a really stoned California surfer dude talking and you’ll get the gist: scarf on head, skate board under arm, a man of the road. But more, he was the only one to effectively stand up to a potential killer – and a racist, insane one to boot.
The documentary shifts its focus to the reporter. “I knew I had found gold when I interviewed him,” says he proudly, and indeed he had. Within a day, there were hundreds of thousands of hits off his interview, and then millions, going global. People offered new surf boards to the bearded hero, and in no time, the kid had an agent, whether he liked it or not. Soon he was on with Jimmy Kimmel. He played warm-up for bands and was all the rage. This happened around 2013, if anyone can recall. What the media ignored, however, was who this kid really was.
They had wanted a likeable hero, a surfer-dude zen wise man who lived for the moment and thought little of his own well-being for the sake of others. Instead, what they got was a messed-up young man from Manitoba who had taken on his surfer-dude homelessness as a persona, a mirage that covered his nervous disorders and painful, apparently loveless (and fatherless) upbringing.
He drank in excess; he was stoned all the time. We also find that the crazed racist had first picked up the hitchhiker before the attack, in which time the young man had given him weed that he said was laced with PCP or Special K or some other mind-destroying stuff. Worse still from the promoters’ point of view, he also messed up hotel rooms. None of this was what they had wanted or envisioned at all.
And that – the handlers – is what this documentary was really about, whether intended or not. The fame-building had taken place in sunny California, where each agent and reporter that was interviewed had the hardened approach of a shark in a feeding frenzy. To get the fame and the money from this new-found phenomena, they rushed in for the first bite, never looking at what they were feasting on. They claimed in the documentary that, while they of course wanted a piece, they were really doing all this for the hitchhiker. This poor homeless kid will now be rich and famous! What more could he want?
Obviously, they were doing it for themselves in an ugly display of greed and raw usury. The kid needed anonymity and poverty, if not intense psychological treatment. His lifestyle was his therapy. With money and fame came substance abuse and fuel for his over-excited trauma-driven nervous system. Finally, all of the attention led him to extend himself into the no-man’s land of murder, and a senseless one at that. He will now sit in prison for the next fifty-plus years.
At first I was simply angry at the users of this guy, looking at them as the Hollywood sharks that they are. Then it dawned on me: which of us has NOT been the target of a huckster? Who among us has NOT done things that we wouldn’t have if not pressed to do them by others: by others who would find some entertainment or profit in the doing without sharing the consequences?
Soft-brained dolt that I once was, and still am at times, I surely have been swayed, not to murder, but to idiocy that may have had long-term consequences. But apart from shameful personal failures promoted by others, we seldom see that bigger-league users might be swaying vast crowds of people in much the same way and for the same reasons – using collective needs and weaknesses to get the folk to do things that profit the users.
We have vintage videos of such things on the History Channel. Hitler stands out as an especially flamboyant example of the user, and the defeated German people as the wounded surfer dudes in SS uniforms, but there are many, many other examples. Did Chairman Mao get down on his knees and dig with the peasants in the Cultural Revolution, or did he use those millions of lives to consolidate his power and his place in history? Did Charlie Manson lead the way in the murders of high-status people, or did he use the fragile and the stoned to bring about his twisted revolution and his fame? We know the answers. We have all been the kid tricked into putting his tongue on the frozen flag pole at one time, so might we not be being used now?
Marxists would have it that our hierarchical system protects those in power, and in certain ways that is true. Still, the old-time users exploited a culture and a religion – general Christianity - that they intended to keep in place. What we are seeing now is a purposeful displacement of centuries of tradition for…what? This is not a small thing, not a twisting of familial ties, say, to buttress patriotism, but an actual re-definition of basic institutions. And this is not being done by one or a handful of intellectuals or New Age priests, either, but by the power elite at large, those running the education systems and the media and the election-proof bureaucratic state. So we have to ask –what’s in it for them?
We know the answer. Although we are being told that all is for our own good, we know that the changes are only good for certain small groups, and probably not for their good in the long-run either. If not for the good of the many, then, we must conclude that, in the end, it is for the good of the few – and mostly for those few who are promoting the changes. So why are we going along with the program?
For one, we are not desperate, not yet. I myself still have to count calories; for two, we would be fighting City Hall, and we all know that you can’t fight City Hall. Most insidious, however, is number three – that the powers that be are using our best traditions to subvert those very traditions. ‘Judge not lest ye be judged; we were all immigrants once; love is love; don’t be a “phobe;” hey, your life ain’t so perfect, so don’t be a hypocrite.’ And, ‘Traditions, particularly religious traditions, are based on fear and patriarchy. Are you one of those?’
It is a devious trap. Like the hitchhiker, we know where we belong, but are sometimes persuaded to think that maybe they are right, that maybe it would be better to be on the other side of the fence. Maybe we are too judgmental, and racist and sexist, and so on. But before we go along with the program, first we must look to those who are wooing us: are they like Christ, willing to lose all and gain nothing to better our lives? Or are they profiting from these changes, either financially or emotionally? Just as important, are these changes improving our lives in general, or have they or will they cause a precipitous demise in order, discipline, and well-being?
Not long ago, a group of us went to Medjugorje, the site of Marion apparitions, where we heard again and again from the laity, the priesthood, and even from Mary herself, that those who clung to the spiritual and moral traditions would decline noticeably in the decades to come. Those who remained in the faith, however, would be ‘saved”, however that might be interpreted. But whether we believe in this or not, it is still smart to check out the cost and quality of the goods that are being sold before we buy. Those stripping society of centuries, even millennia, of tradition have no idea where their new ideas will take us, but they do not seem to be concerned. They are getting what they want now, and to hell with the consequences. Our hitchhiker, left to think about his own betrayal for decades to come, would understand.
While it is my belief that satanic influence underlies it all, it is not necessary to agree with that spiritual possibility to realize that flimflam artists have taken over the show. Beware the shell game. We must keep what we know to be right in our hearts, regardless of siren calls, sneers and jeers, or the promises of wealth and happiness that would shame the likes of the proverbial Nigerian prince.
To play on the famous words of the Who song: Meet the new boss/Worse than the old boss/Let’s not get fooled again.
Ah, the winter doldrums! We have been exceptionally warm here these past few weeks, and, aside from peering over our shoulders for flooding waves rushing off the Greenland glaciers, I suppose we are happy about it. Not so the snowmobilers and skiers and those absolute kooks, ice fisherpersons, but for this writer at least, sidelined as I am with a leg injury, it has most certainly been a plus. But winter is still no picnic. The days have been almost all gray when there is any sunlight at all, and it seems an eternity of boredom and depression has descended upon us.
That’s why, in His infinite mercy, we have been given Netflix, et al. Saints be praised.
But we can watch only so many Tom Cruise action films and Golden Globe winners promoting glitzy post-cultural drivel that will make us want to dye our hair green. So we turn to documentaries, as we did a few days ago. With some of these, and certainly with the one we watched, we sometimes get more than the producers intended.
The hook of this particular one is in the name, “The Axe-wielding Hitchhiker,” which brings up creepy images of Freddy Krueger and ski masks and chainsaws. But that is not what we are left with. Rather, by the end we find a sad emotional basket-case of a young man and a media machine that drove him to murder.
We begin with a bizarre scene of violence captured on people’s cell phones, of a car pinning a public-works man to the back of his truck. A large middle-aged white man emerges from the car screaming out his hatred of black people while announcing that he is the Christ. He’s a nut, and a racist one at that, and a few woman intervene to try to help the black man who is pinned between the vehicles. As they do so, the crazy man grabs one woman in a wrestling hold and seems to be threatening her life when a young long-haired bearded (white) man appears with a hatchet. He hits the crazy man three times in the head with the hatchet (once, we find, with the sharp end) before the crazy man goes down. Police arrive, along with local TV cameras. We see that no one is dead, while one, the long-haired axe-wielder, is pictured walking away from the scene, a large backpack slung on his shoulders. The TV reporter gets the camera man to move over to the young man, who then grants an interview.
Says our hitchhiker, “Yeah, this crazy dude attacks this black dude and then this woman, so I take the hatchet and, like, smash, smash, smash! Got the fucker good,” or something like that. I remember the three-fold “smash.” For visual aid, imagine a really stoned California surfer dude talking and you’ll get the gist: scarf on head, skate board under arm, a man of the road. But more, he was the only one to effectively stand up to a potential killer – and a racist, insane one to boot.
The documentary shifts its focus to the reporter. “I knew I had found gold when I interviewed him,” says he proudly, and indeed he had. Within a day, there were hundreds of thousands of hits off his interview, and then millions, going global. People offered new surf boards to the bearded hero, and in no time, the kid had an agent, whether he liked it or not. Soon he was on with Jimmy Kimmel. He played warm-up for bands and was all the rage. This happened around 2013, if anyone can recall. What the media ignored, however, was who this kid really was.
They had wanted a likeable hero, a surfer-dude zen wise man who lived for the moment and thought little of his own well-being for the sake of others. Instead, what they got was a messed-up young man from Manitoba who had taken on his surfer-dude homelessness as a persona, a mirage that covered his nervous disorders and painful, apparently loveless (and fatherless) upbringing.
He drank in excess; he was stoned all the time. We also find that the crazed racist had first picked up the hitchhiker before the attack, in which time the young man had given him weed that he said was laced with PCP or Special K or some other mind-destroying stuff. Worse still from the promoters’ point of view, he also messed up hotel rooms. None of this was what they had wanted or envisioned at all.
And that – the handlers – is what this documentary was really about, whether intended or not. The fame-building had taken place in sunny California, where each agent and reporter that was interviewed had the hardened approach of a shark in a feeding frenzy. To get the fame and the money from this new-found phenomena, they rushed in for the first bite, never looking at what they were feasting on. They claimed in the documentary that, while they of course wanted a piece, they were really doing all this for the hitchhiker. This poor homeless kid will now be rich and famous! What more could he want?
Obviously, they were doing it for themselves in an ugly display of greed and raw usury. The kid needed anonymity and poverty, if not intense psychological treatment. His lifestyle was his therapy. With money and fame came substance abuse and fuel for his over-excited trauma-driven nervous system. Finally, all of the attention led him to extend himself into the no-man’s land of murder, and a senseless one at that. He will now sit in prison for the next fifty-plus years.
At first I was simply angry at the users of this guy, looking at them as the Hollywood sharks that they are. Then it dawned on me: which of us has NOT been the target of a huckster? Who among us has NOT done things that we wouldn’t have if not pressed to do them by others: by others who would find some entertainment or profit in the doing without sharing the consequences?
Soft-brained dolt that I once was, and still am at times, I surely have been swayed, not to murder, but to idiocy that may have had long-term consequences. But apart from shameful personal failures promoted by others, we seldom see that bigger-league users might be swaying vast crowds of people in much the same way and for the same reasons – using collective needs and weaknesses to get the folk to do things that profit the users.
We have vintage videos of such things on the History Channel. Hitler stands out as an especially flamboyant example of the user, and the defeated German people as the wounded surfer dudes in SS uniforms, but there are many, many other examples. Did Chairman Mao get down on his knees and dig with the peasants in the Cultural Revolution, or did he use those millions of lives to consolidate his power and his place in history? Did Charlie Manson lead the way in the murders of high-status people, or did he use the fragile and the stoned to bring about his twisted revolution and his fame? We know the answers. We have all been the kid tricked into putting his tongue on the frozen flag pole at one time, so might we not be being used now?
Marxists would have it that our hierarchical system protects those in power, and in certain ways that is true. Still, the old-time users exploited a culture and a religion – general Christianity - that they intended to keep in place. What we are seeing now is a purposeful displacement of centuries of tradition for…what? This is not a small thing, not a twisting of familial ties, say, to buttress patriotism, but an actual re-definition of basic institutions. And this is not being done by one or a handful of intellectuals or New Age priests, either, but by the power elite at large, those running the education systems and the media and the election-proof bureaucratic state. So we have to ask –what’s in it for them?
We know the answer. Although we are being told that all is for our own good, we know that the changes are only good for certain small groups, and probably not for their good in the long-run either. If not for the good of the many, then, we must conclude that, in the end, it is for the good of the few – and mostly for those few who are promoting the changes. So why are we going along with the program?
For one, we are not desperate, not yet. I myself still have to count calories; for two, we would be fighting City Hall, and we all know that you can’t fight City Hall. Most insidious, however, is number three – that the powers that be are using our best traditions to subvert those very traditions. ‘Judge not lest ye be judged; we were all immigrants once; love is love; don’t be a “phobe;” hey, your life ain’t so perfect, so don’t be a hypocrite.’ And, ‘Traditions, particularly religious traditions, are based on fear and patriarchy. Are you one of those?’
It is a devious trap. Like the hitchhiker, we know where we belong, but are sometimes persuaded to think that maybe they are right, that maybe it would be better to be on the other side of the fence. Maybe we are too judgmental, and racist and sexist, and so on. But before we go along with the program, first we must look to those who are wooing us: are they like Christ, willing to lose all and gain nothing to better our lives? Or are they profiting from these changes, either financially or emotionally? Just as important, are these changes improving our lives in general, or have they or will they cause a precipitous demise in order, discipline, and well-being?
Not long ago, a group of us went to Medjugorje, the site of Marion apparitions, where we heard again and again from the laity, the priesthood, and even from Mary herself, that those who clung to the spiritual and moral traditions would decline noticeably in the decades to come. Those who remained in the faith, however, would be ‘saved”, however that might be interpreted. But whether we believe in this or not, it is still smart to check out the cost and quality of the goods that are being sold before we buy. Those stripping society of centuries, even millennia, of tradition have no idea where their new ideas will take us, but they do not seem to be concerned. They are getting what they want now, and to hell with the consequences. Our hitchhiker, left to think about his own betrayal for decades to come, would understand.
While it is my belief that satanic influence underlies it all, it is not necessary to agree with that spiritual possibility to realize that flimflam artists have taken over the show. Beware the shell game. We must keep what we know to be right in our hearts, regardless of siren calls, sneers and jeers, or the promises of wealth and happiness that would shame the likes of the proverbial Nigerian prince.
To play on the famous words of the Who song: Meet the new boss/Worse than the old boss/Let’s not get fooled again.
RSS Feed