Real-Life Heroes: "One Giant Leap"

"It was the overwhelming response of people starved for the sight of an achievement, for a vision of man the hero."
-Ayn Rand, "Apollo and Dionysus"

Well, I'm still on summer vacation, but I'll gladly take a moment to honor the heroic crew of Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins, as well the many engineers the rocket scientists who got them there. Despite my Libertarian(ish) opposition to government programs, it was my original ambition to be an astronaut myself (I went with "musical space cadet" instead.)

What was so heroic about the first moon landing? I'm going to turn the floor over to the words of Ayn Rand on this one, who's said it better than anyone else I've heard. How about this:

What we had seen, in naked essentials—but in reality, not in a work of art—was the concretized abstraction of man's greatness.

Or this:

The fundamental significance of Apollo 11’s triumph is not political; it is philosophical; specifically, moral-epistemological.

Or this:

One knew that this spectacle was not the product of inanimate nature, like some aurora borealis, or of chance, or of luck, that it was unmistakably human—with “human,” for once, meaning grandeur—that a purpose and a long, sustained, disciplined effort had gone to achieve this series of moments, and that man was succeeding, succeeding, succeeding! For once, if only for seven minutes, the worst among those who saw it had to feel—not "How small is man by the side of the Grand Canyon!"—but “How great is man and how safe is nature when he conquers it!”

Rand was a big supporter of this event, while other commentators of the day went on about about the "collective" significance of the "Dionysian" Woodstock festival, deriding the "destruction" of the "poetic-romantic glamour of the moon" by the Apollo landing. [Side note: with the recent death of legendary news anchor Walter Cronkite, I have to add that Rand noted him as an "notable exception" to the Apollo-haters, who still exist today in the legacy of the "Anti-Industrial Revolution."] She saw that there was indeed more peace, love, and passion involved in the latter, and gave a better description of the "Apollonian" side of life that did not divorce reason from passion.

Despite the subsequent...lackluster legacy of NASA since the moon landing, Rand reminds us that the ultimate achievement of Apollo 11 isn't scientific, but, in the best sense of the word, "spiritual":

Frustration is the leitmotif in the lives of most men, particularly today—the frustration of inarticulate desires, with no knowledge of the means to achieve them. In the sight and hearing of a crumbling world, Apollo 11 enacted the story of an audacious purpose, its execution, its triumph, and the means that achieved it—the story and the demonstration of man’s highest potential.

In other words,

This was the meaning and motive of the overwhelming worldwide response to Apollo 11, whether the cheering crowds knew it consciously or not-and most of them did not. It was the overwhelming response of people starved for the sight of an achievement, for a vision of man the hero.

An Angel Remembered

I normally distinguish between celebrities and heroes, because the term has been so abused and made meaningless. But Farrah Fawcett certainly qualifies as a hero, not only for her fictional heroic role as Jill Munroe on Charlie's Angels, but for her portrayal of an abused woman in The Burning Bed (I grew up in a house like that, it may has well been a documentary). Farrah also fought a brave battle against cancer, which was nothing less than heroic. Even at the worst of it, she still kept that heavenly smile. Earth has one less angel tonight. Shine on.

(And for those who still think she was just "cheesecake," consider the "Ayn Rand Factor": The Brainy Side of Farrah.)

"Look at this Brave Iranian Lioness"

A special note has to be made for the brave women protesters in Iran, who are even more oppressed under the Islamic theocracy. A Iranian commentator on CNN used the word

shirzan, meaning"lioness," to describe them. What an apt

word.

Check out this video of one such lioness taking on an armed soldier. I wish more American men had her spirit.

And many have taken the death of a young woman named

Neda as a rallying moment; reminiscent of Spartacus, many are claiming "I am Neda."

Heroism in Iran: "Live Free or Die"

I'm currently taking time away from Superhero Babylon to work on music and other matters (not that I owe any explanations; I do this for free, gaddumit.) I really haven't had much to say on heroic matters recently, with Heroes and Smallville having concluded their seasons. I haven't had much inspiration from reality, either; it seems the concept of heroism in America has taken a hiatus as well...

But the situation in Iran demands acknowledgement.

I hesitate to say too much, because I really don't know much about Iran beyond the immediate fact that it's a theocratic state that is usually depicted as being anti-American whose people are usually depicted burning American flags while the leader vows "Death to Israel." I'm not rushing in to comment on the goals and motives of the protesters beyond the immediate surface level motive of dissatisfaction with the election results; I find it hard to believe that suddenly Iranians are "pro-freedom," given the strong Islamic tradition there. There is also the question of Mir-Hossein Mousavi's past involvement with the Islamic fundamentalists. I know nothing about him, but I am hearing a lot of contradictory information, that he is a hardliner and a reformist, that he had to say what they wanted to hear in order to get this far, etc..

I am not going to theorize on what I don't know, or pretend to be able to infer anything to make any real meaningful commentary beyond a personal statement. That said, to the extent that the protesters are putting their own lives on the line for what they believe in, and the readiness of Mousavi to accept martyrdom, I can't help but feel admiration. When you compare the fire and spirit of the Iranians versus the apathy and complacency of too many Americans towards the government advance into outright fascism, it's hard not to feel a little bit that we've entered the Bizarro world. While American "tea party" protesters" are afraid to violate a permit law, Iranians, whatever their motives, are standing up and telling their government just who is in charge, giving life to the Colonial American phrase "Live free or die."

I'd like to say that "we are all Iranians now," except that too many Americans still don't understand what's happening at home. Hopefully, the situation in Iran will remind everyone that "the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." If the protesters in Iran are truly fighting for freedom (and not just another form of tyranny), they have my utmost support and are true heroes. And if the picture above is an accurate reflection, then I, too, am an Iranian now.

(It's strange that such a revolution would start in Iran, but on reflection, not so strange if one takes into account in heroic mythology of the Trickster archetype. I've been meaning to take on this topic here, but haven't have the time or motivation. Well, it seems the Trickster will have his way with me anyway, and this will soon change.)

Heroism in Music: Alanis Morissette

I honestly never thought that I'd write something along these lines about Alanis Morissette. I tend to not be a big fan of music from the 1990's in general and my main interaction with her prior to this is that for a short period of time I dated a girl who was obsessed with "Jagged Little Pill." But the video below should fully explain why.

It can be said that what could be called soulfulness in the 1990's got to be so freakishly common that it completely lost its effect. Ms. Morisette was in a large way part of this trend. The backlash to this movement was a shift towards bubblegum pop in the form of The Spice Girls, Brittney Spears, Mandy Moore, Jessica Simpson, the Backstreet Boys, Nsync etc etc etc... To be honest for a while it was nice to just have a happy little melody that you could hum to with a distinct lack of heartfelt ballads about abortion anxiety, the plight of workers in the third world etc...

For me that fun ended with the Black Eyed Peas and Fergie. And specifically the song Ms. Morisette covers in the video below. The song "My Humps" is an experience in killing your brain. Repetitive beats, IDIOTIC lyrics. Lyrics which go as far as using a pathetic euphemism and then a verse later spell out the euphemism's literal meaning.

"What you gonna do with all that junk? All that junk inside that trunk?" becomes "What you gonna do with all that ass? All that ass inside those jeans?" and the collective IQ of western civilization drops five points. Add to this a pseudo-female empowerment theme that makes the pornographic parody of Spice World "The 5 Sins" look like "The Color Purple" or "Iron Jawed Angels" by comparison.

Quite frankly what Ms. Morisette's cover/parody of this song does is embody a favored line of Internet and radio personality Lindsey Perigo, which I often don't agree with and who would not likely agree with this assessment. When discussing music he always uses the question "Why eat shit when you can have food?"

This shows a song with complex unbroken melodies as well as skilled and soulful vocals contrasted against the depths to which modern music has dropped. This version of the song, makes all of modern pop music leave you less than satisfied and maybe even feeling a little unclean. It should. So kudos to you Ms. Morisette for reminding the world a little bit of what it's missing out on.

Star Trek 2009: Illogical...but Fascinating...

 The J.J. Abram's reboot of Star Trek is, as they say, "not your father's Star Trek." And yet, "the more things change"...The facelift is certainly notable, with an Apple store esthetic that renders the little touches of nostalgia, such as the sound effects, out of place. The music doesn't reflect the original score until the closing credits, wisely, the old theme just didn't feel right in this version. The effects, of course, are stunning, but there is something to be said for the "feel" of the old show. Even some of the intimations of the earlier actors are subtly captured in the new version (or not so subtly, in the case of Dr. McCoy!). 

 So what is the common denominator between the old and the new that does work? The heroism, of which there is a lot on display. Captain Kirk, of course, remains the space cowboy that we remember, fearless and capable. The whole crew gets their chance to show their heroism in their own way as well, from the physical (Sulu's fencing abilities, Captain Pike's courage, and, of course, the ill-fated red shirt) to the mental (Chekov, Spock, Uhura and Scotty). The story itself doesn't have a lot of meat, but the action speaks volumes, and everyone steps up to the challenge, capturing the "can-do" attitude of the original series. In an age of pyscho-vigilantes like Rorschach of Watchmen or the ineffectualness of The Dark Knight, this is a nod to an earlier era that discards the camp and keeps the hero.

 The story, while thin, is interesting in one respect; many have pointed out the lack of a "message" that was often found in the original series. The creators, I believe, have said that would wait until the sequel, so I'm going to take them at their word for the following. I don't believe they intended to plant a "big message," and the message that I detected was inherited from the original series. It is a message that brings the original series to its, uh, "logical" conclusion. The message is in the tension between reason and emotion. 

 The battle between reason and emotion is a classic theme of literature and mythology, most notably captured in Nietzsche's use of the archetypes of Apollo and Dionysus in The Birth of Tragedy. Nietzsche proclaimed the logic of Apollo useful, but Dionysus the winner. And so does this incarnation of Star Trek. In the original series, the tension was symbolized by the Doctor and the Vulcan, the bleeding heart and the logical, emotionless alien. Kirk was the man in-between, who consulted both sides. Often, Spock, who after all, is half-human, would be the butt of Kirk's jokes, but still respected for his contribution. In this version, however, the message is clear: emotion is superior to logic. Though Spock is welcomed aboard, in the end, it is in the inferior role. Even Leonard Nimoy's appearance to his younger self confirms this, with the push to "feel, not think." (Spock even wishes him "luck" in place of the standard "Live Long and Prosper." 

 Now why am I harping on this? Is it not true that logic is only a tool of life, not the purpose? Well, at least they recognized the importance of logic, but my problem is with the suggestion and embracing of a dichotomy to begin with. It was Nietzsche who formalized the duality, but it was Ayn Rand who smashed it with a rejection of any dichotomy, embracing a symbiosis instead. This view is the basis of the album Hemispheres by the band Rush. At its best, the original Star Trek did the same. In this case, logic is reduced to the technical work of building and flying spaceships, leaving the ethical, political, and psychological realms to chance and emotion. What possible defense is their for this interpretation? Why is this dichotomy so persistent?

 Arthur Koestler, in his book The Ghost in the Machine, theorized that the human brain, besides having two hemispheres which we divide as the emotional right-brained and the logical left-brained, was also made up of three larger divisions: the reptilian, the mammalian, and the neo-cortex. The evolution of these parts was not smooth; the neo-cortex was "slapped on" to the others, and they don't always communicate in harmony. Thus, in extreme situations, logic gives way to the older, animal structures, and the amygdala "hijacks" the brain in to a flight-or-flight response. Spock, being half-human, is not immune to this, apparently, as demonstrated in his outburst. This is where the plot fails; Kirk goads Spock into an emotional reaction, prompting Spock to relinquish his temporary control of the ship, and Kirk takes over. But having proved that Spock was not impervious to emotional breakdowns, how does that make Kirk qualified? 

 On Kirk's first encounter with "Bones" McCoy, we find the good doctor fretting over space germs, personal matters, and everything else that humans find themselves dealing with on a daily basis. We find Spock conflicted over his half-human, half-Vulcan heritage. Kirk, on the other hand, we find with a fearless, can-do attitude, one that puts him at death's door on more than one occasion. But we do not encounter an idiot; he is portrayed as a genius-level mind. This is presented somewhat superficially, however. We don't see him studying, it's simply implied through a few verbal demonstrations and assertions from Captain Pike, who has "reviewed his file." Ayn Rand demonstrates a similar characterization when she pits the main character of Arrowsmith against The Fountainhead's Howard Roark. One is superficially depicted as a genius, the other is demonstrated. To paraphrase Rand, this movie's Kirk is depicted along the lines of "sorry babe, I can't go to the pizza joint tonight; I have to split the atom!". She argues that such a character is impossible; to really understand such things, it takes a certain kind of dedication...Whether one could be like this in real life is debatable, but it is of no coincidence that many Objectivist are characterized as "Vulcans." 

 And yet, we can draw on real-life leaders to see that not all successful leaders are Vulcan in approach, and not all scientists are fit to be leaders. Some leaders get so caught up in "thinking" that they over-think, or "rationalize."  To bring it back to Koestler's theory, Koestler ends his book with the suggestion that the solution to the dichotomy is to be found in pharmaceuticals. Star Trek presents another alternative: creativity. That is where the character of Kirk, at his best, succeeds. He acts on the information at hand, but is not bound by it. Whereas Spock is trained in logic, he is not trained to think creatively. McCoy, who would panic in an emergency, is urged by Kirk to be more grounded in reality and less in fear. Kirk is not bound by fear or logic; rather, he uses logic to his ends, to find creative solutions where others would admit defeat. Refusing to be beaten in an unbeatable computer simulation, which is meant to confront the cadet with fear and the possibility of loss, Kirk simply cheats by beating the program. In battle, the enemy will not be expected to play fair. This infuriates Spock, who is confronted by his own paradox: how can he design a program to expose cadets to fear when he, a half-Vulcan, is trained not to embrace emotion? That, ultimately, is why Kirk is captain: the "instinct" to survive, even when logic says otherwise. In that sense, Kirk is a trickster in the vein of Odysseus, one who will break the rules in order to get the job done. It is not the always the "smartest" who gets the job done. 

 In it's own, clunky way, the lesson of the movie that Spock learns is not to disown logic, but to be human; to be human is not to be an emotional animal, or a rational animal, but a creative animal, and not accept fate as a given. When Kirk is confronted to be "something greater," it is not the "greater good" that is being invoked, but greater as being something more than a determined plaything of fate. That is what Spock learns, he is not bound by the dictates of logic, but liberated by it, to be not determined by his heritage, but free from it, from tribalism or fate. But James T. Kirk is captain because he is able to combine the use of logic and the primal "instincts" of life to create new possibilities. Where Dr. McCoy would get emotional and fly off the handle, and where Spock would not be able to think "outside the box," Kirk represents the romantic realization of not what is, but "what could be." That is the shared and lasting legacy of all incarnations of Star Trek.

Villains in Disguise

Part of the reasoning behind my last post Sometimes you just can't side with the hero came from another example of something I wanted to side with but couldn't. What I'm referring to is the film An American Carrol which came out some time last year.

When I first heard about the premise I thought it had a ton of potential. Between Kelsey Grammer's sophisticated intellectual humor sensibilities and David Zucker's silly slapstick it seemed like this film would have a little something for everyone. That is of course until it served to remind me precisely why the association between Objectivists and conservatives goes only so far.

The plot was a retelling of Dickens' "A Christmas Carrol" with Michael "Malone" (Moore) in Scrooge's place and abolition of the Fourth of July as his goal. It starts out interestingly enough with Malone painting Cuba as an island paradise but it starts to fall apart quicker than you'd think. There's a lot of extremely vague Anti-American sentiment coming from Malone which if someone were critiquing this (and I guess that I am) they could say that it plays right into Moore's regular statements that his view of America is the valid one and he's the real patriot while all the Conservatives are the fascist bastards. Granted you could say that this is just a comedy and I shouldn't think too deeply, but I don't like package deals and I refuse to laugh at someone if you try to lump in the (microscopically few) things he's right about with the (astronomically large) things he's wrong about.

The truth is the film falls apart at this level and specifically it's treatment of Jihad. There's a common thread among a lot of conservative parodies of who we are at war with. The most common one is the whole idea that the suicide bombers AREN'T sincere in their motives or dedication, look at just about any parody of the modern Jihadist movement and you'll see a scene where everyone is passing the buck on the suicide mission.

You do it!
No you do it!

A corollary to this is the idea that "Radical Christianity isn't as bad as radical Islam." There is a scene in the movie where Rosie O'Donnell makes a statement about this and it's supposed to prove how stupid she is (so much so that the Moore analog distances himself from her after she says this). Meanwhile just last week I saw a news story on ABC News Nightline discussing a sect of Christianity in Congo which convinces parents that their children are witches who require a costly, as well as painful and violent, exorcism procedure to be done. This isn't Salem in the 1700's it's happening in 2009.

There are sections of the Bible which would condone and perhaps even encourage this practice, much the same way most if not all of the Koran supports violent Jihad to convert or destroy the infidel. The problem in the American/Western conservative movement is that they take the highly hypocritical practice of American Christianity, which relies on modern people to bring a goodness to it which is not actually there.

These same people often complain about the hypocrisy of a Michael Moore or Noam Chomskey for stopping short of supporting bread lines and Gulags, while their own hypocrisy stops them short of witch trials, inquisitions, and other draconian practices... when it actually does.

Moore tacitly tries to undercut capitalism, yet lives very comfortably because of it. And Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reily and Michael Savage and their ilk praise capitalism and the concept of rights which are beyond a majority vote as outlined in the constitution, yet they support majority rule to rob individuals of their personal rights when it fits their particular standards, and they'll sell out capitalism any time one of their pet groups seems to suffer because of it.

The film wasn't the cause of all this, only a symptom. It sometimes brilliantly and sometimes foolishly points out Liberal hypocrisy whilst wallowing in conservative hypocrisy. Thus after expecting to see some heroes worth rallying behind, I just see another set of villains.