CHICAGOCINEMA.NET

MORE ABOUT WHAT I’M TRYING TO DO HERE

And what I ask of you.


The world/internet is full of people who call themselves Citizen Journalists and they do great work. (more about them in the future)


They adhere (more than most “real” journalists) to high standards of accuracy and do their best to act as if they’re being employed by the NYT or Washington Post.


I intend to be a Citizen Pundit and counter all the BULLSHIT spewed forth by the legion of Blathering Turds in the Corporate Media.


My job is much easier than Citizen Journalists, because THERE ARE ABSOLUTELY NO QUALIFICATIONS OR STANDARDS FOR PUNDITS.


Not a single fucking one. Go check if you want.


All you have to do is be hired by some Network, who puts the title PUNDIT under your yammering head on the TV screen.


Basically, you just declare yourself a Pundit and go from there.


If you effectively speak enough lies and half-truths and spin corporate bullshit (and have some connections) you get to be on Big Time TV.


I intend to be The People’s Pundit and won’t just speak truth to Power, I’m gonna speak it to EVERYONE.


Some of you folks who actually know me in the “real” world (such as it is anymore) will have either been in my life during or perhaps directly witnessed/participated in some of the stories I will recount.


Don’t freak out and think that I’m ever going to try and make you look bad or try and make myself the hero of every story.


I’ve been a selfish boorish asshole my entire life and am PAINFULLY aware of that fact- and I’ll be raking myself over the coals harder than anyone.



You’ll see that soon enough.


But if I miss a crucial fact of a story, or forget to put it in an important detail, or if you have something *constructive* to add to or say about the story I tell- I’m relying on you to tell me.


However, I won’t debate the particulars of the actual events themselves. They happened. Deal with it. I have.

I’ll NEVER use real names (or any names at all if I can help it) and I’ll die before I reveal the names of the Innocent (Dragnet time). That’s a blood oath, my friends.

As for the rest of you: Good Pundits (kind of a theoretical concept these days) get popular because lots of people enjoy their insights and share their columns with others.

So please, MAKE ME FAMOUS. I’ll take it from there.

If you do, a World Of Shit will fall upon me. But I am ready for it.

It won’t have been the first time.

IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING

As I continue to advocate for the reality that we shall need to to remain at home for at least another two or three months, a thought occurred to me.

Some of you may wonder (especially those who have known me for a long time) if I am doing this just because I like hanging out at home and want an excuse not to go back to work.

While I’m the first to admit that my default setting is introvert hermit and that I’ve strategically avoided conventional employment throughout my life, let me make one thing absolutely clear:

When this lockdown hit I was preparing to kick my life into high gear.

The Open Stage that Stann Champion and I had been doing for over 6 years was finally getting some recognition and hit the groove that he and I had been striving for since the beginning.

I was working full time in an office, at a fairly complicated sociological research job that I enjoyed a great deal. I was busting ass and crushing it every day, working much harder than I needed to in order to get my research/scholarly chops back, with an eye to entering Grad School, perhaps even Law School.

My harmonica playing was hitting yet another level, and I was going to spend 2020 getting out and showing the music scene what the last 3 years of hard woodshedding had done for me. And finally take the next step toward fronting my own band.

I’d finally found a Theater Company composed of talented musicians and singers who might have an interest (and more importantly the training and skills) to help me actualize a Gilbert & Sullivan-esque Musical that I’ve been kicking around for several years.

And most importantly, I’d finally gotten the PTSD-related depression/anxiety problems that had been hampering me for 20 years under control, and was remembering what it was like to actually feel good about life and myself.

SO DON’T THINK FOR A SECOND THAT I’M STAYING AT HOME BECAUSE I DON’T HAVE ANYTHING BETTER TO DO.

I just have accepted the reality that this extreme personal sacrifice is what I need to do— for myself, for the people I love, and (drum roll) for the good of society.

People used to gladly make sacrifices for the good of society all the time, but the practice has fallen out of favor in the last few decades.

And that’s pretty much the central reason we are in this mess.

So SUCK IT UP, Pilgrims.

Pretend you’re Sonny Rollins on the Williamsburg Bridge. A chrysalis waiting to emerge as a beautiful butterfly. A rocket waiting to be launched.

Eat right, keep active, learn and grow. Work toward becoming your best self.

Because when it’s safe for us to emerge, we’ll have a whole society to rebuild- in one way or another.