Thanks for getting back to me James Knight
Glad you saw the NYT article.
I had a conversation yesterday with a non writer friend. When I hung up the phone, I felt more than a little distressed. That was someone who needed to read that Kristof article. Of course they will not.
Which is the problem we face as we try to get more people to care. Because we do have to try. Silence and apathy does nothing. Even if our own individual efforts produce only tiny results.
Did you see Jennifer Senior’s article in the times yesterday: The One Kind of Distancing We Can’t Afford? She addresses the issue of psychological distancing (PD) which is exactly what I heard from my friend on the phone yesterday. PD is a way of making covid 19 unthreatening to my friend and my friend’s view of the world. Totally misguided but a tactic that the deniers and minimizers use with regularity.
So selfish. And cruel, actually.
I also want to ask you whether you saw Julio Vincent Gambuto’s article on Medium: Prepare for the Ultimate Gaslighting ?
You probably have read it. My partner did last night. It is on my list for today but as I understand from him, it’s about, among other things: the power of big business to now fix our ills with shiny new toys so they can convince us that none of these Covid 19 horrors really happened. The greatest campaign ever to convince us to feel normal again. Justifying us to go back to work even if it’s not safe because the unspoken agenda is to further fill up the already bulging bank accounts of the 1%.
( And BTW, you are conversing with someone, me, who appreciates business. All the good things about business. Because they ARE there. Or could be. What I don’t support, since I watched it in my former career, is the greed, the hoodwinking, the lies, the bullsh**, the screw the customer tactics, the implied and often spoken mission statement declaring money is more important than life or basic human decency.)
Even after everything I witnessed until I finally quit, I still believe that one can run, as I proudly did, a transparently ethical business rather than pretending to do so. Pretending in this last sentence above, basically meaning “lying”). End of this particular rant. For now.😳😀
I understand that Gambuto suggests how to resist this marketing bologna coming from some sections of the government as well as from industry.
If you have read his piece, I’d be interested in your thoughts. I should have done my reading before the day is over.
You know, these comments are a good place for this discussion. The more who read this the better.
Funny aside on the topic of Gambuto’s marketing discussion. For recreation in these times of shut in, my partner and I decided to rewatch Mad Men. It’s been awhile since first seeing it. Even without yet reading Gambuto’s article, Mad Men does a bang up job of highlighting his point about the gaslighting about to come.
Great chatting with you, James. You take care and be well too.
