A minor Threat

[geoffsebesta]

Comments

[houbanaut]

To me it seemed to be about the horrors of starvation, poverty and general crappiness in third world countries, and how we who live in the rich world tend to more or less ignore it as long as it stays far away (it's not our job, we have our own problems, etc.).

And if any of it does spill over here (in the form of illegal immigration, terrorism, etc.), we just use force to take care of it.

It's more interesting when expressed as subtext and metaphor, though.

[geoffsebesta]

Not what I intended at all, but I'm certainly in sympathy with that interpretation.

I was speculating about evolution and how new forms of life seem confusing and horrible to older forms of life. I was intrigued by something I read in Neil Shubin's excellent book Your Inner Fish, which I reposted here:

http://megatexas.livejournal.com/144542.html?thread=513694

and thinking about how badly that first preconodonth-infested fish must have suffered. How badly its life must have sucked for a mouthful of eels to be an improvement.

I chose the third world (and it's very, very tenuously connected) because of the overwhelming metaphor. It was interesting to me that I could provoke such a specific response with such a limited symbol set. The combination of a manual labor workplace with a guy with a broken accent, the phrase "back home," and a young black girl in very simple clothing created a whole symbolic structure. There's no doubt that I'm talking about the third world. Even though I'm not saying anything about the third world at all. That's fun! I like stuff like that.

A lot of the staging and overtly quotidian symbolism came from reading these articles:

http://www.mstrmnd.com/log/802
http://jonnys53.blogspot.com/2007/06/what-you-may-or-may-not-have-seen.html

and saying hey I want to do that too.

Apologies if I'm explaining too hard; explaining is my favorite part.

[houbanaut]

Interesting, thanks!