no cool

I see people as energy. As something that interacts with the mythical symbolic framework I have inside my head. I see people do magic – very rarely – but when they drop their cool and they venture to be what they are, or what they want to be – it’s more than I can hope for. It takes a shitload of courage to not care about the outside opinions and to just be.

We’ve been, I know we’ve been. My last year of school was all about thinking that the world is an oyster and we can make whatever we want out of it. I still do think that – in a much more reserved manner and no longer with a “wise” backdrop to it. I think I’ve gotten wiser, but isn’t that what all of us think every two to five years?

There’s also an option of not thinking about it at all. Just chillin, y'all know, going with the flow and stuff. I’m not wired for that. And I’m aware that this brings unwanted complications and all that serious-faced stuff. But that’s what I am.

Of course we all think we’re gonna be big. We’re gonna be something. But are we? It scares me to think otherwise. It’s scary to pour your soul out - and it’s not productive nor does it work in your favor. But what are you, if you’re not your true self? You’re a tool, a cool object, but cool doesn’t drive me, does not inspire me at all.

The people I’ve loved in my life are the ones who’ve had the courage to challenge themselves, to venture beyond the normal, the perceived, and the expected.

I need someone to see me like I see people. I see people as something magical. Anyone who has insight, or wit, or anything that makes me hold my breath for a second – is magical. I know it’s cheesy. But that’s how it is.

I may not surprise you. Cause I’m the same as you – the same decaying matter, not a unique snowflake (as outlined in the Fight Club). But if I don’t surprise you, then we are more alike than you think we are.

Would you kill me? If I needed you to, if I desperately had no other option, would you?

Ribbon whaaat?

This whole conflict between Hollywood and the alternative cinema makes me giggle a bit. Every European filmmaker declares that Hollywood is decadent and that he despises it and spits on those who even try to compare his genius to anything of Hollywood. The latter of course does not give a shit as it makes a shitload of money and rarely takes the time to get involved in useless European discussions.

My argument certainly isn’t that Hollywood movies are good and European are bad; what I’m aiming at is that the juxtaposition – intentional to the bone – is simply childish.

Take The White Ribbon that I painfully watched yesterday. Yes, perhaps it is a piece of art in the cinematographic sense; yes, the cast is without fault whatsoever (especially the children). But once again I object the “art for the sake of art” standpoint. You may call me trivial but seriously, I need a message in a movie and that’s what I think they’re for. And if you deprive me of catharsis, if you leave me with nothing more but a tape of black and white images in my head after two hours – I consider those two hours wasted.

It’s what Lithuanians love doing with contemporary cinema as well. The freaking country of cinematic disaster, traumatized by gloomy Russian literature and not talented enough to pull off a Dostoyevsky they march on with their “Brisiaus galas” kind of mindset. Oh, there’s gotta be tears. And a deep dark depressing onset. And some violence for the sake of violence (and this is not addressed to Zero as I consider it a truly wonderful statement. And some very few truly inspiring movies like Balkonas. In your face Nereikalingi Zmones). Like the recent Lars von Trier, whom, I’m sorry, I don’t understand either (I mean duuude, if you suffer from severe depression and various phobias – do you really have to put me through it too?). And yet again I may be called an ignorant and superficial cinema nazi, but seriously, do we NEED that violence? Is it the only necessary tool to bring out the message? Cause honestly, I’m getting a bad case of compassion fatigue.

And yet there are masterpieces that may be a bit gloomy, a bit slow, but they do it for a reason, a message, something my brain feed on like vultures for days and days in a row. Like Das Leben der Anderen – it could be regarded as a slow movie but to me it seemed perfectly paced, bringing out the essence scene by scene, sound by sound.

Like the Cidade de Deus may seem too violent at times but it has nothing to do with hitting a penis with a hammer (thank you, Lars, for engraining that image in my mind for eternity). It’s a heartbreaking story which absolutely cannot be told without the images of violence – it is the essence of it, it disturbs and yet leaves you hungry for peace.

I even truly loved The Believer, as it sets off to explore self-hatred and self-search in such a painful, personal way. And Little Ashes – a quote from which I use in the opening of my blog and which has become part of my everyday life.

I could go on and on with examples of brilliant movies made all around the world for the purpose of sending a message. And to my mind a movie is much more powerful if it has one, rather than when it simply is a statement of a self-absorbed artistic individuality.

Warning: media

Warning: this post may be biased and narrow-sighted as it is infused by frustration while still in a lecture.

Why did I choose to study journalism? This question crosses my mind more often now than at any other time in my life. This is because during the time of my studies in Lithuania I could blame the system for the journalism studies’ shortcomings – the whole educational system is rotten, young people don’t contribute to the educational progress etc etc.

But then I went to Denmark – the best journalism school in the country and a university that ranks in the top 60 of the world’s universities. And then I went to Australia – to a no1 journalism school in Sydney. And my frustration has not diminished, vice versa - it has grown fiercer with every day.

What is my problem? The humongous gap between practice and theory. I get a lot of counter arguments to this one saying that most disciplines face this controversy. I say we have to look at a particular case – journalism is all about practice. You cannot read McLuhan or McQuail and then just easily adapt it in your work. It does not work that way cause the guys are not living on another planet, they are living in another universe for god’s sake.

Journalism scholars think they know better and journalism professionals think they know shit. The scholars research the media in a way it should function ideally – and I don’t even know what the ideal is (please do inform me if you’re aware of these ideal conditions). Has it ever functioned in an ideal system? No. Has the need for it decreased because of that? Quite contrary, in my opinion, journalism is at its best today, because there’s so much social interaction and higher accountability due to the fact that the access to information is no longer limited to the privilege of the journalists.

Yet the scholars see a problem in the PR overtake, in the diminishing role of the journalistic professionalism, in the lack of specialization etc. Of course there are problems but this is not the problem. The problem is that the scholars are not addressing the problems in a right way. They distance themselves from the practice; take the position of some kind of a preacher who knows better and therefore misses the target completely.

Scholars love saying that if journalism won't start abiding by the scholarly advice it will become so rotten it will actually one day die. I find this hilarious and in this case want to remind you something that Socrates said and Plato recorded on paper:

"The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”

According to him the youth should have ruined the planet completely and driven the world to anarchy if not worse. And yet we progressed and our world is more wonderful than it has ever been. That’s what I think about journalism as well – every generation of journalists’ thinks that they are the last ones who are credible and yet journalism survives and, further more, progresses. Maybe not in an ideal way, but still.